


and when the heatwave breaks, remember me

by forestdivinity (ForestDivinity)



Series: One Shots [11]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Comfort, Drug Use, Frottage, Grief/Mourning, Hallucinations, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kinda, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Learning to Grieve, M/M, Mild Gore, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Suicide Attempt, The Hargreeves Need A Hug, Time Loop, Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-25 23:21:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30096714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForestDivinity/pseuds/forestdivinity
Summary: How do you learn to grieve when you've never lost a soul in your life? How do you move on when you know they should be with you?Mourning is something Klaus has never had to do until now. The pain it brings is immeasurable, the hole that Dave left gaping. Moving on feels impossible with such a weight on his shoulders but he has to try.
Relationships: Klaus Hargreeves/David "Dave" Katz
Series: One Shots [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/535576
Comments: 23
Kudos: 51





	and when the heatwave breaks, remember me

_"You look so perfect, honey. My lovely boy," Dave is whispering in his ear, low voice and skin pressed up against Klaus's body as if he can't get enough of touching. It's hot, and it's sweaty because this is Saigon, and Klaus has never felt humidity like you get in Vietnam, constant steam wrapping around you like a glove. And of course, this is Dave, above him and around him. Dave, who is all-consuming in his passion, overwhelming Klaus with every touch._

_He could never have predicted this turn in his life, but he doesn't mind the path he's taken—windy as it may be because it led him here. Led him to Dave. How can he complain about that?_

_"Don't stop," Klaus hears himself murmur, his throat hoarse with desire. In this stolen moment, his voice sounds very far away, lost in the haze that fills their little motel room. When he looks up, Dave's eyes are a brilliant blue despite the dim light that tinges everything yellow, a sepia tone that reminds him of old photos. Even so, the sight takes his breath away._

_"Didn't plan on it, sweetheart." A roll of Dave's hips punctuates his words; Klaus chokes on a moan because this takes his breath away, too. In his head, he imagines that he's crawling towards salvation. Wonders if this is what it means to give himself over to a higher power. No matter how hard he'd tried, he'd always stumbled overstep two._

_Dave's mouth trails over his, and then they're kissing again, lazy and slow. Against his mouth, Dave's breath is hot, tastes vaguely of cardamom and spice. Klaus thinks of the dinner they'd had, crowded in the corner of a bustling restaurant, people talking in rapid-fire Vietnamese around him. God, but he's hungry for more, wants to devour Dave._

_He tangles his hair in the sweat-slick curls at the back of Dave's head, tries his very best to deepen the kiss. Wants to press his tongue in, map every contour of Dave's mouth. Nothing is enough; Klaus is a parched man, desperate for water._

_"Slow down, kitten," Dave parts from him with a wet noise, and a choked sound that's almost a sob leaves Klaus before he can stop himself. Part of him wonders when he got so emotional during sex. When did it start to involve his heart as well as his body?_

_"You said you wouldn't stop," he tries to hiss, but his voice is shaky, pitched awkwardly. Cracking too high at all the wrong moments—Klaus never feels suave and experienced with Dave the way he should. In fact, sometimes he feels like a virgin all over again. Just the thought is enough to make his cheeks flush darker, and he curls his mouth into a pout, the cherry on top of his strawberry ice cream face. Dave, the perfect asshole that he is laughs, it's a fond, gentle sound that fills the room. Shouldn't he feel offended? Shouldn't he be upset? All those responses would make sense, Klaus thinks, but honestly, his heart is melting. All his negative feelings seem to wash away under the tidal wave of joy that Dave brings to him._

_"I'm not stopping, baby. Why don't you let me worship you?" Calloused fingers run their way down Klaus's cheeks, brush through the scruff that Klaus refuses to shave no matter how many times Sarge chews him out. Without thinking, he finds himself angling into the touch like a cat—ever the kitten that Dave likens him too. Even this gentle touch contents him more than he'd care to admit. Soothes the addict brain he has that's always screaming for more._

_"Dave-vuh," he whines despite himself, just to be contrary; he doesn't want to seem too easy. Accepting love has never come naturally to him, not since he was a child learning that care is always conditional. Bless his heart, Dave tries to prove otherwise, but Klaus is an old dog who struggles to learn new tricks. Today Dave doesn't indulge his whining; Klaus gets no reply other than the press of lips back to his own. Hands cover both his cheeks and squish them until he looks like a puffer fish, all lips and chub that Dave litters with kisses. Despite his whining, Klaus can't help but laugh into the kiss, bubbly giggles that escape between the little presses of mouth and tongue that Dave peppers across his face._

_"That's not my name, sweetheart. I don't know any Dave-vuh's. Just plain old Dave here, Klaus," Dave teases, light and airy as a breeze. With a groan, Klaus lets his head flop back onto the thin motel pillow, and he sticks his tongue out at Dave to try and hide the way his lips curl into a smile._

_God, but he's in love. Praying to every higher power he's heard of to be sure they know he's thankful for it—if they exist, they need to know this: that Klaus loves Dave. And Dave looks stunning above him, bathed in smoke and lousy lamplight, his tanned skin glowing. Every part of Klaus wants to know every part of Dave; he needs to press them together, find a way to become one._

_And Dave, the teasing bastard, is stopping him._

_Really, he should get his own back. Show Dave just how convincing Klaus Hargreeves can be. Enticement has always been his middle name—one of them at least—and over the years, Klaus has worked more than one man into a frenzy. It would be easy to rock his body forward, show Dave a good time, but he finds he doesn't want to._

_Dave makes him want to slow down, enjoy the little moments that make up the big picture. Fucking cliched as it sounds, it's true. Sometimes he wonders if anyone else has ever felt love like this before or if he's the first to be drowning in the enormity of his own feelings. Sometimes he's scared of himself the way a diver is scared of coming up for air; he needs Dave, and that need could destroy him. Klaus blinks, shakes his head to rid himself of that fear as he drags his hands through Dave's curls. In the humidity, they've gotten tight and bouncy, and Klaus dreads to know what his own hair looks like._

_"You're such a tease, Dave," he breathes out, trying to hook a leg around Dave's hips and drag him closer. For his effort, he gets another lazy kiss, all tongue and spit that has him panting by the time Dave pulls away._

_"No, honey, I just want to treat you how you deserve. "Fingers trail down his neck as Dave speaks, and Klaus finds he has to squeeze his eyes shut because the thought of that hurts. Makes his heart jump out of sync for a second because Dave doesn't understand, doesn't know what Klaus deserves. Certainly not Saigon with its bright lights and words that are foreign on Klaus's tongue. Certainly not gentle touches and lazy kisses, the love that Dave practically bathes him in. What he deserves are back alleys and club bathrooms, hands around his throat to remind him that his life doesn't matter—not in the grand scheme of things. Telling Dave that would only make him sad, though._

_"Dave, please…. I want this. I want you," Klaus isn't begging, not yet, but his voice is scratchy with desire. Above him, Dave laughs, drops his weight a little so that Klaus can feel him, heavy and solid. Not enough to smother him, but it knocks his breath from his lungs regardless. Feels like every nerve is lighting up where they touch, and it makes his head spin._

_"I know, kitten. I know what you need." Hands trail from his face down his body as if Dave is trying to map out every mole and wrinkle Klaus has. His mouth follows, lips burning against Klaus's skin. Teeth graze over his neck where Dave kisses, never quite biting down, and it's enough to have Klaus squirming, impatient with his own desire. Despite how Klaus can't stop whines dripping from his lips, Dave doesn't change his slow pace, sucking marks along Klaus's collarbones. Hickeys that he'll be able to hide under his fatigues but both of them will know they're there, purple and red and marking Klaus as Dave's. Klaus has to breathe out at the thought, slow and loud, as heat pools at the very base of his spine, impossible to ignore._

_"Daveee… c'mon," he's whining, every eggshell barrier of pride he has cracking under the weight of Dave's attention. When a thumb brushes across his nipple, Klaus shudders—practically jumps out of his skin. A moan spills out from between his lips, and Klaus tangles his hands in Dave's hair, tugs when Dave laughs at his reaction._

_"Relax, kitten, I've barely started," Dave hums, squeezes his nipple lightly to make Klaus groan again, arch into the touch. Every inch of him is sensitive with anticipation, so the pinch has the desired effect, Klaus's body going taught. It's not fair, he thinks, how Dave can reduce him to this with nothing more than a few soft words and gentle touches. Not fair how his own body betrays him with its responses._

_"Yeah, I know. That's the problem," he huffs, drops his head back into the pillow. Sweat drips down his spine, uncomfortable little droplets that are just enough to ground him in the moment. Klaus frees his hands from Dave's curls and smooths them across the hard planes of Dave's shoulders, squeezes the well-earned muscle there._

_"You want more, sweetheart?" There's a lazy grin on Dave's face, the type he gets when playing poker when Klaus knows he's about to cheat someone out of their cigarettes or—if he's lucky—a whole case of beer. Blue eyes are alight with mischief, and Klaus is reminded, all at once, of why he loves Dave. The love of his life is an unrepentant dick at times._

_"Asshole, you know I want more." Klaus rolls his eyes, squeezes his leg where it's still wrapped around Dave's hip before letting it fall. It was starting to get numb anyway, so he graciously accepts the lack of skin contact. "Maybe I'll just get myself off. I don't need you to have a good night."_

_Dave raises a brow, obviously knows it's an idle threat. One Klaus won't go through with. He's still smirking, a quirk of his lips that Klaus wants to bite off his face. For a moment, they're at a stalemate, staring at each other through the haze of the room while they wait for someone to crack. Unfortunately, Klaus is impatient and riled up with need. When he groans again and pulls, shoves at Dave, Dave just laughs and brushes his lips across Klaus's pouting mouth._

_"Swearing won't get you what you want, Klaus," Dave murmurs as a reminder and Klaus whines, smacks his heels against the thin, spring mattress until it creaks. Maybe it's childish, but Klaus feels like a spring that's been wound too tight. Any moment now, he's about to explode. Somewhat literally, too._

_"Davee-vuh," he can't help but whine again, batting his palms against Dave's broad shoulders._

_"Okay, okay. You're so impatient, kitten," Dave whispers into his ear before biting down on the shell of it, making Klaus groan. At the same time, Dave rolls their bodies together, hands gripping at Klaus's hips to hold him still. The desperate sound it rips from him is humiliating and arousing, and it echoes around the room._

_"Nooo… I just know what I want, "Klaus huffs, smacking at Dave's shoulders again. It gets him another nip of teeth, this time on the underside of his jaw, and Klaus shivers in desire. His fingertips run up Dave's back, tracing the hard angles covered by a soft layer of fat that gives Dave the look and feel of a firm teddy bear—perfect for cuddling. He loves how Dave's body feels against his own, wishes they never had to let go of each other._

_Well, maybe sometimes. There are some things that even Klaus doesn't need to see, and they usually occur after squad Spice Nights, where they dare each other to try various local foods, trying to prove who can eat the hottest meals. Those nights, he avoids the tent and even volunteers for night watch duty. Army men, he thinks, are almost worse than seven competitive siblings. Still, he can't deny he gets a little homesick when he sees the rough housing, the way Tiny and Tennessee and Stack end up in piles on the floor._

_"Hey sweetheart, you still with me?" Dave asks, kissing the pulse point on his neck, making Klaus's heart flutter like a moth taking off._

_"Yeah, just got distracted," he laughs as he speaks and smiles up at Dave, reaches up to fiddle with his curls again, wrapping them around his finger. Pretty little proto-ringlets have formed in the humidity, and Klaus imagines an older Dave with longer hair that he can style and tug on—one day soon, he thinks. When they get out of this place._

_"Oh, what by?" Dave's mouth is still trailing over his neck, and Klaus hums leans his head back for better access. His breath comes out in a slow exhale as Dave rubs a thumb over the bones of his hips, pressing against the line that trails down to his cock. Shivers go through him, and he swallows, shakes his head._

_"… it's dumb." Talking is more distracting than his thoughts; he just wants Dave to get on with it and touch him. God knows he's aching for it._

_"Nothing you could say is dumb, honey," he's told, and that breaks a little of the tension that had filled the air, weighing it down. Klaus snorts and rolls his eyes, manages to get a knee up so he can nudge it into Dave's side. A surprised noise leaves Dave, and he leans back as Klaus sticks his tongue out. If he'd been stood, he would have put his hands on his hips, but trapped (as pleasurable as it is) between Dave's body and the lumpy motel mattress, all Klaus can do is wriggle._

_"Now that's blatantly untrue, Davey-baby. You called me an idiot yourself the other day," he says as a reminder, poking his fingers into Dave's back and rubbing under his shoulder blades where he knows Dave carries tension like he's fucking Atlas, weighed down by the world. Offended, Dave lets out a little huff, and he leans down, bites Klaus on the neck again, teeth pressing down tight. It's just the right side of painful, and Klaus shudders, can't hold back the low groan of delight that leaves him. By the time Dave pulls away, there's a bruise, dark red and aching, on the side of his neck, and Klaus has to breathe through his nose to stop himself from gasping._

_Not fair. Dave plays dirty, and he's a bastard for it. Klaus loves him more than he can say. More than there are stars in the fucking sky, each one of them glittering thousands upon thousands of miles away as they watch. Or would watch if they weren't safely hidden in the dingy little motel room they'd rented for the night—just the two of them, with no eyes to avoid._

_"You walked into a fire and were shocked your pants started to smoulder."_

_"It was a very shocking experience, Dave!" Klaus exclaims, rolling his eyes like Dave is the idiot. In his defence, he'd been rather drunk at the time, and that was ignoring the powder he'd managed to snort once Sarge had left the vicinity._

_"You walked into a fire…?" It's not quite confusion in Dave's voice because Dave knows him. Knows Klaus better than most people do, probably better than his family, who he's not seen properly in over a decade (bar Ben, who doesn't count and never will count). So Dave isn't confused by Klaus, but definitely a little lost on how exactly he's supposed to react._

_As usual, Klaus is no help to him; he just blinks._

_"So?" he asks, and Dave lets out a weary sigh and shakes his head slowly as a smile spreads across his face. It's the type of look that Klaus wants to kiss as if he might be able to absorb it into himself—all that love, all that affection. If he could keep a little bit in him for the rest of his life, he'd be happy, Klaus thinks. It would keep him warm forever, a comforting heat though not the sweat-slick oppression of a Vietnamese summer._

_"Come on, baby, just tell me what had you all distracted." Dave is a smart man; that much is apparent. Instead of letting Klaus run him in circles until the original point of the conversation is lost, he cuts through Klaus's attempts at distraction like a hot knife going through lard—that is to say, with ease. It's frustrating, if only because Dave is too perfect at unravelling all the loose threads that make up Klaus Hargreeves, worming his way behind Klaus's walls without even getting short of breath._

_Klaus brings an arm up to cover his face and groans, low and deep. In return, Dave runs his fingertips up his sensitive ribs to make him squirm._

_"Fine, fine! God, it was—I was just thinking of Spice Night, okay?" The words come out all at once in a tumble, so quickly that Klaus stumbles over them more than once, his voice cracking. Above him, Dave shifts and then pulls away a touch. Not enough to have left, Klaus can still feel the press of their hips and legs together, the heat of Dave's body against his, but there's a layer of air now between their chests and stomachs, one that wasn't there before. It makes him want to whine in annoyance. This was why he hadn't told Dave._

_Klaus opens his eyes when he realises he's closed them, and Dave is staring down at him with an incredulous look, a familiar furrow between his brows. His lips are parted just enough that Klaus can imagine slipping his tongue between them, taking Dave's breath away. Then again, he can always imagine kissing Dave._

_Unfortunately, Dave breaks the spell when he speaks: "I'm here trying to get you off, Klaus, and you're thinking of Moose shittin' his sheets?"_

_Klaus sits up fast enough that they almost smack their foreheads together, and Dave nearly goes flying off his body as he bats at his lover's chest—he likes calling Dave that, his lover. What he doesn't like is a reminder of one of the worst nights of his life. Which is saying something because Klaus has had a lot of awful nights._

_"No! Fuck, Dave, don't remind me of that!" Hands leave Dave in favour of covering his eyes, and Klaus mimes gagging, wondering if they should just give up on sex for the night. Nothing kills the mood more than Moose and the memory of that eventful night. Eyes squeezed shut behind the palms of his hands, Klaus almost jumps when fingers gently curl around his wrists to tug them down again._

_There's still a smile on Dave's face when Klaus squints up at him, blinking away the fizzing, tv-static colour from his vision as his eyes readjust. "You brought it up."_

_Asshole._

_"No, I tried to avoid bringing it up, and you whined until I told you. So can we put it back down? And get back to the fun stuff?"_

_Dave hums, running a thumb over Klaus's knuckles. Sparks ricochet their way down Klaus's spine, and he narrows his eyes as Dave pulls his hands up, kissing across the back of them._

_"Evidently, I'll have to try harder to keep your attention," he says softly, and Klaus chokes on a whimper at how low his voice has gotten._

_"Think you can handle that responsibility, Davey?"_

_"Well, I was class president, honey."_

_Klaus pauses for a second, face freezing and then screwing up in confusion. What the fuck is a class president? He wonders if it's another sixties thing that he's just unaware of—the same way he doesn't know who the actual president is. Then again, that was true in the present (future? God, he hates time travel) too._

_"Is that like… being in charge of the school?" he eventually asks, nudging their legs together._

_"No. No honey. Man, I always forget you were homeschooled."_

_"I don't know if I'd call it schooling. And to be honest, I think the word home is a stretch too." Klaus shrugs his shoulders and glances away for a moment, watches the ceiling as if it might have some answers for him—maybe if he knew the question._

_"Oh Klaus," Dave looks extraordinarily sad for a moment, his eyes creasing up in the corners. Klaus reaches up, brushes a thumb over the sharp angle of his cheekbone._

_"Hey Davey-baby, no need to look so sad. It's all in the past," he murmurs, hating to see Dave looking so down. Klaus feels like both the kicked puppy and the person kicking; it's a strange feeling._

_"It still shouldn't have happened, kitten. You didn't deserve to go through that."_

_"And you didn't deserve to get drafted into this shitty war and yet—"_

_"And yet here we are." Dave finishes for him when his voice cracks, smoothing his hands up Klaus's thighs._

_"Here we are," Klaus repeats, his voice a little shaky. Still, he smiles when he looks up at Dave, eyes dark and a little glossy. After a moment, he lets himself relax into the touch of Dave's hands, the way they rub along his thighs—this at least is familiar. Touching and being touched; it's been a part of his life for as long as he can remember._

_"Gonna let me give you what you need now, darlin'?" When Klaus finally lets go of the breath he'd been holding, Dave speaks, leaning back in so they can kiss again. Maybe it's not entirely healthy to replace all his bad feelings with sex (lord knows, Ben would probably yell at him for it if he was here), but Klaus only has a few coping methods, and this is one of the healthier ones, he thinks. Anyway, it's better with Dave. With Dave, it's not just physicality, their bodies moving together. With Dave, there's attention, care, love._

_And Klaus had rarely known the feeling before Dave bathed him in it._

_"Yeah," he whispers, licking across his mouth. Already, his lips feel dry again, and he tries to tell himself he's not nervous, but god knows he is. Everything about Dave makes him nervous, the good type of anxiety. Like riding a roller coaster all the way to the peak and then waiting for it to drop. He'd assume that's what it's like anyway; Klaus has never ridden a roller coaster—he did end up on the top of a Ferris Wheel once, nineteen and high as a kite, but that's a whole different story._

_"That's it, kitten." Hands smooth up his thighs, and Dave parts them a little wider, hikes one up onto his hip again. Encouraging Klaus to hold on, stay close. Klaus likes the way Dave takes initiative, and he loves the way their bodies fit together almost perfectly. Maybe they were made to be this way._

_"Dave," Klaus can't think of anything else to say when their hips roll together. Both of them are still in their underwear; the white cotton has gone sticky and skin tight with sweat. More of it seems to pool like liquid gold in every little nook of Klaus's body—it should be uncomfortable, but all he can do is crave more, want more._

_Against his lips, Dave smiles. "That's it, honey, say my name."_

_Klaus is so hard it practically hurts, an ache between his legs that he can't ignore any longer. Another moan breaks free from his mouth, but it's swallowed by Dave kissing him again, this time longer, deeper than before. Their tongues brush together, and Klaus is a circuit finally connected, a lightbulb finally switching on. Sparks fly between them, and he wriggles, ruts up like a man possessed._

_His briefs are constricting, Klaus wants them off, but he also doesn't want to give up a minute of their bodies touching. What he wants is for them to just magically disappear, but his life would be too easy if his power was to get people naked in an instant. Would have been a better power than ghosts, Klaus thinks, and then promptly forgets the thought when Dave tangles his fingers in his hair and pulls. Head tilted back, he groans, a low sound that echoes as it fills the room._

_"Da-ave—" It's like he doesn't know how to say anything else. Maybe he doesn't; perhaps he lost all sense of the English language the minute Dave came into his life._

_"I love it when you moan for me, Klaus," Dave trails his free hand back down, hooks his thumb into one side of Klaus's briefs to edge them down. It takes a moment, a little wriggling, but eventually, the tight fabric is far enough down his legs that Klaus can kick them off. The freedom makes his head spin, his cock dripping precum as it slides between their bodies. When he moves, the head catches on the damp, scratchy fabric of Dave's own underwear, and it makes his toes curl, tears dripping from the very corners of his eyes._

_"Please, fuck… Dave, c'mon get naked for me already, please, baby? I wanna feel you," Klaus knows he's babbling, but once the words start, he can't stop them. They tumble out, one after the other, without his permission._

_It's the warmth of the room, the burning press of their bodies. All of it leaves him overwhelmed, and Klaus knows he should pull back, escape, lest he faint from heatstroke all together, but he can't._

_"Shh, kitten, I have you," Dave promises. In a practised move, he gets his own briefs off and flung across the motel room, landing god knows where on the floor. Somewhere far away and good riddance to them too. The shifting to get them off involves a lot of Dave squirming, nudging their bodies together, and Klaus has to grit his teeth to keep quiet._

_"You, fuck, you're such an asshole, Dave. You're doing this on purpose," Klaus accuses, and Dave doesn't reply except to smirk against his lips and then bite down on the lower one, sucking it into his mouth until Klaus whines, bruised and desperate for more. It's more than he can bear. Dave is going to drive him insane._

_"Beautiful." A thumb traces over the cherry red bruise of his mouth when Dave pulls away, and Klaus huffs, frustrated and aroused and far too in love because he's not even that mad at the continued denial. He does, however, thrust his own hips up, just to listen to Dave grunt when they slide together, hard and wet._

_"I hate you," he grumbles without a bit of hatred in his voice. In fact, he sounds soft even to his own ears, so it's no wonder that Dave laughs, presses down tighter. Their bodies rock together, the rhythm of it slow but unsteady. Klaus hooks his thigh higher until it's practically around Dave's waist with every uneven push, breathes out moans whenever Dave's mouth touches his skin._

_"I love you too," Dave whispers against his collar bone._

_Klaus sobs, realises there are tears leaking down his cheeks. He presses closer to Dave, hides his face in Dave's curls as he's driven ever closer to that terrifying, unknown edge of orgasm. Unknown only because this is Dave, and no-one has ever pushed him out into the ocean like Dave. Sometimes Klaus thinks he's willingly walking off a cliff for Dave._

_And he'd do it again and again and again._

_"That's it, kitten, Klaus, yeah," Dave keeps talking as Klaus writhes, cries, a great gaping maw open inside of him. A hand works it's way between their bodies, Dave's because it's big and warm and covered in familiar callouses. When it wraps around their cocks, both of them at once, he can't help the croaked groan that leaves him._

_"Dave, I can't, I'm so close…" his voice is tiny, high pitched, muffled against Dave's curls. Dave coos, his thumb swiping across the wet head of Klaus's cock, smearing precum over it. Strangled noises leave him like a scream, and Klaus's back arches off the bed, sweat dripping from his body. He can't think of that though, all he can think of is Dave._

_"You're doing so good, that's it, sweetheart, gonna cum for me?"_

_"Gonna cum," Klaus repeats, his body as taut as a bowstring. Dave's hand doesn't speed up, but his grip tightens a tad, sends bright sparks through him. Every part of him feels wet, soaked through—a rag needing to be wrung out._

_And Dave is the one doing the wringing, pulling him tight._

_"Cum for me, Klaus," Dave whispers, and that's enough to send Klaus spiralling. His toes curl against the backs of Dave's thighs, breath coming in short, sharp pants._

_Maybe he's flying, falling, finding his way from the sky all the way into the ocean like Icarus but fuck if he doesn't love it. Cum leaks from his cock, covering Dave's hand and the both of their bodies, but Klaus can't think of that because his brain is fucking melting. He's his body, every part of it alight._

_"Fuck, fuck, fuck," he gasps, and Dave keeps moving, rocking them together as he pants his way through orgasm, leaving everything so sensitive that he can't catch his breath. Around Dave's waist, his thighs clench like a vice, and he realises that he's trembling. Moments later, Dave groans and bites down on his shoulder, adding to the mess as he reaches his peak._

_It takes a moment for Dave to pull his hand away, smearing sticky fluid across the sheets. They don't pull apart, though, Dave shifting and resting their foreheads together, mingling their breath._

_"Shit, kitten," Dave whispers, low and throaty—Klaus loves hearing him like that, absolutely wrecked. He can't stop the smile that spreads across his lips, tilts his head up to brush their mouths together._

_"I think you broke me, Dave," he mutters, his legs aching, his heart pounding against the inside of his chest. Carefully, he untangles his legs, and they thump against the sheets. A cat-like smile spreads across Dave's face, and Klaus giggles softly—after all, Dave did manage to get the cream. Dave begins to laugh, too, until they're both giggling, clinging tight to each other._

_Finally, Dave manages to speak: "Proud of it, Klaus," he murmurs, and Klaus bats lightly at him, takes in a deep, rattling breath. Exhaustion is already beginning to settle in, his eyes sliding half shut as they bathe in the afterglow. Klaus's legs are still shaking, trembling with exertion, but he enjoys the dull ache in them, the way it reminds him of what they'd shared. Sure, they're sticky and hot, and Klaus is dizzy, still seeing stars behind his eyes, but it's perfect._

_Dave's hands run up and down his back, tracing familiar patterns, nails scratching along his skin. It's soothing, the delicate touch that threatens to send him off into sleep._

_But then his grip tightens, squeezing around his back and ribs. Klaus groans, "Dave..."_

_"You have to wake up now, sweetheart," Dave whispers, and when he speaks, it's low and sweet. It's not correct. Klaus isn't asleep yet, just thinking about it. Wanted to let the night time take him. But he's not asleep yet._

_"I am awake, baby," he murmurs, blinking up at Dave. There's a smile on Dave's face, those eyes still that same shining colour. Such a captivating blue. Klaus is drunk on endorphins, his head spinning and slow as molasses._

_"No, Klaus, you have to—"_

* * *

"Wake up! Klaus, you have to wake up—" Hands squeeze around his chest, press down, pump. Bruising intensity. Hard and unforgiving, and Klaus can't figure out what's going on. Feels like he's woken up in a nightmare. Why is he here? What's happening? Trying to figure it out is like trying to fight the tides — that is to say impossible. Around him, the world beeps, rocks, too much noise, all voices he can't discern.

"Wake—"

* * *

_The jungle is alight with sound around him, delights and sweet airs as old Billy Shakes had said, except Klaus can't find any delight here. Just the constant buzzing of mosquitoes and stomping of men in army boots. War, he thinks, has a distinctive sound. Marching echoes in his ears even when he sleeps now, the steady one-two of each step that sets the jungle floor a flutter. He slings his rifle over his shoulder, lets it drop against his back. It's a familiar weight pressed against his body; one Klaus comes to appreciate the longer he spends in Vietnam. Today, he's at the back of the line with Dave, and he sneaks a touch, brushes his fingers against Dave's own. It's a risky move, but Klaus has always toed the line of danger almost eagerly, compared to most people._

_Dave reaches back, curls his pinkie around Klaus's own, and squeezes for a second before letting go. Even that is enough to have his heart aching with adoration, falling out of rhythm with their walk. It's unfair how Dave can do that to him with nothing more than a squeeze, send Klaus spiralling out of control._

_"Should we tell Tiny he's got skid marks on the outside of his fatigues?" Dave whispers as he shoves nearer to Klaus, a smirk spread across his features. Their shoulders are close enough to bump now, so Klaus does, nudges them together in a way that he could pass off as friendly if anyone happened to notice. Somehow that's the hardest thing about being stuck in Vietnam, not being able to be open about his relationship. That, or the multitude of unruly dead that litter just about every spot Klaus enters—American and Vietcong alike._

_In the high afternoon sun, sweat drips down his forehead. Klaus assumes it's sweat at least, sticky, and wet as it finds its way into his eyes. Possibly, it's just leftover rain from the unexpected shower that had managed to soak them all through. In the grand scheme of things, the rain hadn't lasted longer than a minute, and over and done with kind of affair, but all of them are still dripping. Vietnam never really lets you get dry. At least it's warm, Klaus thinks. He knows from experience there's nothing worse than being wet and cold and unable to dry out—has lost more than one friend that way. If anyone he'd ever known could be called his friends. Fairweather is an accurate description of most of them, happy to string him along until they've sucked everything, they can out of him._

_Or he's sucked everything he can out of them. Dave nudges him again, raises his eyebrow as he eyes Klaus and then Tiny, drawing him from his thoughts._

_Klaus snorts and muffles it behind his hand, making sure that they don't alert the squad ahead of them. Specifically, Tiny—Tiny John Carter might be the shortest in their group, but Klaus knows he can throw a punch like a man twice his size. Also knows that he's not afraid to bite._

_All in all, he's a man after Klaus's own scrappy heart, but there's a reason he doesn't play poker with Tiny despite them both being fans of both games and betting. Klaus still has teeth marks embedded into his bicep from the last time they'd gotten into the cards and even more into the drink._

_"No way, I'm not being responsible for that. Tiny Temper more like," he hisses back, sticks his tongue out in Dave's direction. Their shoulders bump again, smack against each other lightly, but Klaus can't stop his smile._

_Dave shoves back and rolls his eyes, the brilliant blue of them obscured from Klaus's gaze as he does so. "Don't tell me you're afraid,"_

_"Shut up! You only want me to do it because you're still scarred from the ass-ripping he gave you!" Klaus isn't afraid of Tiny, but Dave has been trying to teach him self preservation instincts, so it's only fair that Klaus chooses when to exercise them. Anyway, he spent plenty of years fighting people better than him; he doesn't particularly like getting into trouble._

_Well, not the type that involves throwing punches anyway._

_"Am not," Dave insists, his cheeks going pink as he laughs, breathless and barely audible._

_"Are too!"_

_"Keep your voice down, Hargreeves!" Tiny turns to look at them, eyebrow raised, and Klaus has to swallow his laugh, mimes zipping his lips shut and throwing away the key. Dave covers his mouth with his hand as Tiny shoots Klaus a look that would slit his throat open, given half a chance. Eventually, he grunts and turns back around, once more revealing the streaks of what Klaus hopes is mud up his ass._

_As soon as Tiny is out of earshot, Dave breaks down in giggles that should be unbecoming of a soldier in worn army fatigues. Instead, it just makes Klaus's heart ache with affection, a feeling that bubbles up hot and warm. It drips across his skin, makes his eyes crease as he shakes his head._

_"You, Dave Katz, are a terror. How is it that I'm always the one who gets in trouble, and you manage to get off scot-free?"_

_"Because you have all the subtlety of a bull rampaging around a china shop, Spook." It takes Dave a while to gather himself enough to speak, his voice coming out croaky from how hard he'd been laughing. Klaus rests a hand on his hip and raises an unimpressed eyebrow if only to hide the fact that all he really wants to do is kiss that grin right off Dave's grinning lips._

_"Excuse you, I can be plenty subtle," he tries to deny, putting as much offence as he can into his voice until it warbles in the back of his throat. It fails to break Dave's laughter. Instead, he just leans down (after checking no-one is listening, of course, because Dave is far more aware than Klaus of the consequences of their actions) and whispers in Klaus's ear._

_"Says the one who almost got us caught last night…" It's a whispered tease, Dave's voice dropping an octave in a way that's not fair because Dave knows how that sends heat curling down Klaus's spine. Heat tinges his cheeks, a faint pink that's barely noticeable under the almost ever-present sunburn that Vietnam has given him. One would expect even him to be able to work up a bit of a tan, but Klaus has always been pale—vampire had been Diego's favourite nickname when they were fourteen, and he'd gone through a Lestat phase. One that he still denied to this day._

_Klaus blinks the thought of his brother away, ignoring his homesickness the way he has since he was seventeen and wandering the streets all alone. "Shut up, that was your fault too. You know what that move with your tongue does to me."_

_"Aww, Spook, but you look so cute when I tease." Dave winks and pulls away just before Tiny turns to glare at them again. A nervous chuckle leaves Klaus, and he gives Tiny a smile that's mostly teeth and doesn't reach his eyes, hoisting his rifle up on his shoulder again. Tiny's eyes are a glint of grey among the bright colours of Vietnam, and Klaus wonders how he never noticed that before. It's an odd colour, for sure. And the glare of them has him wanting to shiver._

_When Tiny finally looks away again, he lets out a breath, one that had gotten caught in his chest without him realising it was stuck. He turns back to Dave with wide eyes and huffs, poking him in the chest._

_"Then, don't complain about the results."_

_"Okay, okay. Though maybe I should change your nickname to Bull?"_

_"Don't you dare, David Katz! I'll never-" Dave slaps a hand over his mouth halfway through his words, and Klaus would feel offended if he didn't hear it too—the distant sound of rifle fire. It's a familiar buzz, one that rattles you down to the very bone. Just the noise of it seems to sap all life from the jungle around them, and he looks at Dave, who nods. Once. Twice._

_Then they're on the move. Klaus looks up and is startled to find that Tiny isn't ahead of him any longer—none of the squad seems to be. How had they fallen behind? Hadn't Tiny just been looking at him with those sharp grey eyes, as pointed as the tip of a knife? When he turns his head to the left, he's relieved to see Dave is still at his side, but it doesn't stop the way his heart is pounding._

_They have to hurry, have to catch up to the rest of the group, but Klaus can't figure out where they're meant to be going. Forwards, of course, always forwards, but panic is like smoke—it obscures all his coherency. "Dave, we have to find them," he pants out._

_"I know, come on, this way, Spook." There isn't a hand around his own, the way he would like, to guide him, but he follows Dave regardless. Would follow Dave into the end of the world if Dave told him to. Still, the underbrush is thick, and the world seems to be spinning, if only in his own head. It's not long until Klaus finds himself falling, a common enough occurrence in the dense Vietnamese jungle where vines and roots litter the floor, barely hiding the numerous traps._

_Something explodes into life in the distance, a battle ripening up, and Klaus fumbles to get his balance, try and right himself. Dave's hand is on his back, pulling him up by the worn collar of his shirt, the press of it familiar if hot and wet. Around him, the world is sapped of colour, and Klaus chokes on his own tongue. Sweat drips into his eyes, down the back of his neck. It reminds him of clammy fingers trying to claim him, too many memories to sort through._

_Ahead of them, there's gunfire, the sound of shouting orders. Too close and yet too far. They should be in the thick of things, but Klaus can't feel his legs, surely can't stand on them like this._

_"Dave," he's trying to speak, but his tongue is suddenly lead in his mouth, and he can't see straight ahead because all the noise is too loud, filling his already ringing ears. All his senses are jumbled, puzzle piece edges trying to connect, but none of them are the right size, the right shape—round holes with square pegs and all that._

_"You need to get up now, Klaus," Dave is saying, and his head throbs a steady one, two-beat, "come on, get up. No time to slack."_

_"I'm coming," Klaus wants to say, but the words choke off in his throat as if something is in the way and—_

* * *

"You need to get up, Klaus, come on, you scrawny bastard—" someone is hissing, their thick with tears. Klaus can't breathe; his stomach is rolling, mouth filled with acid that burns his tongue. Sweat drips down his neck, trails over each bump of his spine, and he gags. Convulses against the sticky tile floor.

"Roll him over!" someone else yells, and his whole world spins on its axis, his body burning up a fever, "He's going to—"

* * *

_"I hate my life."_

_Klaus is hugging the toilet like it's his last lifeline, Dave holding his hair out of his face as his stomach threatens to rebel yet again. Every part of him aches, from his head to his hands to the joints in his big toe. Hangovers have never hit him this hard before._

_Though, he's never gone quite so long between binge stints before, so maybe that's the reason why. Not to mention it's hard to get a hangover when you're always drunk—though that's difficult now. Sure, they drink on base, but it's cheap beer that's more water than alcohol to the point that it can barely be called booze. Klaus is grateful for it, but he tends to stick to the drugs—they're somehow easier to get and do a better job at keeping the ghosts away._

_Not that last night had been a way to keep the ghosts away. No, last night was a long-overdue bit of fun—a party between the long days and even longer nights—and Klaus was paying for it now. Under his gaze, the toilet bowl spins in and out of focus, and Klaus grips the porcelain tighter as if it might stop him from going under._

_"I'm never drinking tequila again," he informs Dave, resting his forehead resting against the seat—unhygienic, sure, but Klaus has rested in worse conditions. Slept in alleys and dumpsters and snorted coke off them too when he had no other choice, Hell, Dave had even tried to wipe at the toilet bowl with tissues and his shirt before Klaus had collapsed in the bathroom and barfed up the contents of his stomach for the first time. Sweet of him, if entirely unnecessary. The toilet had been cold then, a relief from the mid-morning heat, but even that's sticky now, warm where he's been leaning against it for a little bit of relief._

_"I told you to slow down, honey," Dave whispers, stroking his fingers through Klaus's hair. He sounds sympathetic, if not empathetic, and Klaus whines._

_"I couldn't let Murphy beat me! I have a reputation, Dave," he insists and then winces in pain, his own volume making his head sting. The noise sends little lights to dance behind his eyes, a glittering disco ball putting on a show just for him. Dave takes his complaining like a champ, even leans forward to press a gentle kiss right to the back of his neck._

_Any other day it would send shivers of anticipation down his spine, leave little-Klaus eager for action. Sex is something that's nearly always on his mind—and if it isn't, well, it can certainly be put there with the slightest of suggestion. Today, with a hangover at least the size of a small army truck, the kiss does nothing but makes him feel warm, loved. It's more than enough._

_And it's the good type of warm too that spreads out from his heart and over his body. Not the stupid heat of the room that he can't seem to escape. Just thinking of how the temperature is only going to rise throughout the day makes him want to vomit again. He urges, shakes, and swallows roughly._

_Thankfully, it's enough to stop the threat that had started to grow._

_"At least Sarge isn't here," Dave murmurs, "or Tiny. Tiny would be tearing you a new one right about now. "Hands stroke through his hair, pull the damp strands away from his face as Dave speaks—it's not really long enough yet for it to get in the way, but the gesture is appreciated, nonetheless._

_Dave is good like that: caring, kind, thoughtful. All the things that Klaus never expected to get. Definitely didn't anticipate landing himself in the fucking Vietnam War to find them, but life finds a way—and this time with no dinosaurs around, thankfully._

_Klaus isn't sure how he'd deal with dinosaurs._

_"He's such a grumpy bastard," Klaus laughs around his words, remembers how Tiny always manages to get into a fight, all fists, and teeth. It reminds him of himself, bitter and sweet all at once. For years, Klaus hadn't hesitated to throw himself in the metaphorical ring—just as long as he was assured of losing._

_Winning was never his priority; it was just about getting broken._

_Had he fought last night? Had Tiny? All his memories feel scattered; no matter how hard Klaus tries, he can't grasp them properly. Klaus has a feeling he's trying to grab at smoke. His thoughts might be visible in the air, but Klaus can't catch the strands. They're as intangible as a ghost. He squints down at the toilet bowl, and it swims again, circling water going down a drain—the pinpoint of a wet tornado._

_Not right. Whirlpool. Klaus takes a breath through his nose and lets it rattle through his chest, escape through his mouth._

_Tequila. A bottle or two? Then Murphy, his face a blurred mess, daring him to go shot for shot. Klaus had never been able to resist a challenge or a chance to show off. In Vietnam, his issues didn't stand out; he was just one among the many. Just another broken soldier, so he had to be the best at it (had to be the worst). There had been a club. No? A bar, somewhere in Saigon. Klaus couldn't name which one they'd ended up at. They were all the same. Music, lights, girls hanging off their arms, getting Dave jealous whenever Klaus pretended to flirt. They would dance (alone, together?) and find a backroom to kiss in if they were feeling brave enough. More tequila. Another shot. Another._

_Another._

_The problem was, there had been a hundred nights like that, a hundred shots that he couldn't count right. What was one more? Trying to focus makes his temples pound, a steady four-beat against the bones of his skull coming from the inside out. Klaus swallows down the groan that's threatening to leave him if only to stop Dave from worrying._

_Speaking of Dave, he was talking. Klaus had zoned out, distracted by his own thoughts—or lack thereof._

_"…and this coming from my own little menace," there are hands on his shoulders now, rubbing out the tightness that Klaus hadn't realised he had. That weight that had been holding him down all morning (all his goddamn life). Dave sounds fond, soft when he speaks. It tears a crack open somewhere between his stomach and his ribs; Klaus doesn't know what to do with that pain._

_He breathes out sharply through his nose this time. Has to take a moment to weight out the waves, sickness, pain, heat. They all rush through him, one by one. When he closes his eyes, it's only because his head fucking hurts and not because he's crying and trying his very best to hide it._

_God knows he has to hide it._

_When he talks, it hurts. Who knows how long it's been? Time is hot taffy right now, pulling on and on in sticky white strands like cum, only more gelatinous. Klaus gags on it, blames it on the hangover, wishes he were still drunk. Anything but this._

_"Excuse you, David Katz, I am a delight. See if I let you hit it again," he snarks. Forces himself keeps his voice light - possibly a little rude. If only because he might sob if he does anything else._

_Can't be crying in front of your Vietnam boyfriend, Klaus Hargreeves. Can't be crying at all, says a voice that sounds suspiciously like his father. Except his father is dead. Except his father is alive. Except Klaus sees ghosts every day but now and all he wants is a drink._

_Fuck._

_Dave just laughs again, oblivious to Klaus's dilemma, his internally racing thoughts. Thumbs dig into the sore spots below Klaus's neck until the tension releases; it hurts until it leaves him limp. Klaus groans and goes boneless. Maybe Dave isn't as oblivious as he thinks._

_"I don't think I'll be hitting it today, regardless, honey."_

_He's not wrong. Klaus wants nothing more than to curl up in their tiny motel bed with its broken springs, drinking seltzer water and eating pretzels. God, what he'd do for a good, old American pretzel now. Doughy and salty, the type of pretzel that leaves your mouth dry for hours after eating it, the same way a lousy joint does. Cottonmouth, where no matter how much water you try to drink, you can't seem to get rid of the fur on your tongue._

_Is there such a thing as a bad joint? Anything works, so long as it gets you high, that was Klaus's motto. Had been for the past seventeen years, and it had served him well._

_Ben would disagree, but Ben isn't here._

_"Ugh," is all he says, draws the sound out as long as he can until its vibrating in his chest and making his nausea worse. Klaus can't think. All his thoughts race away from him, angry, galloping horses. All he can do is grip on for the ride—no use trying to make sense of them now._

_His head hurts. His head always hurts. The universe never gives him a break._

_"What's all that noise about, sweet cheeks?"_

_Every sappy pet name Dave gives him makes Klaus's heart light up, and it hurts, but it helps him ignore the old ache in his knees, the way the hard tile digs into the bruises that litter his shins. Klaus doesn't remember how he got the bruises, but that's not an unfamiliar feeling. Years ago, he wouldn't have thought twice about spending hours on the floor; now, all he wants is silk pillows, cool ice water. Some relief from the pain, that endless well of it inside of him. Or at least freedom from the way the world is boiling, sending rivulets of hot oil down his skin._

_If he's lucky, he'll swing one of the two. Dave always does his best to make him feel better, and most of the time, it even works._

_"I hate that you're right; I'm getting old, Dave-vuh."_

_"Don't worry, my darlin' old man, you're still pretty. I'll come to visit you in the retirement home. "Dave is smiling, hiding his face in the back of Klaus's neck, so close that Klaus can feel the curl of his mouth._

_It makes him whine, a long and drawn-out sound. Klaus wants to turn, tries to move his body at the sudden urge to look at Dave. He needs to see his face again, do his best to commit it to memory. The angles of his jawline and the swell of his lips. Lips that Klaus has kissed more times than he can count, a face he's held in his hands and yet when he tries to think, he can't picture Dave properly. All he can remember are his eyes, blue as the sky and the sea._

_"Don't call me old," he says because it scares him. Thirty years old, and he's still scared of growing up. In his head, he'll always be eight and begging for freedom._

_"Sorry, honey," Dave is laughing now, and Klaus's body feels heavy, too heavy to move. A hand rests on his hip, rubbing lightly across the exposed bone there. Moving feels difficult; Klaus lets his eyes slip shut as he sways on his knees. The whole room spins around and around on a pivot._

_"No, you're not," he murmurs because it's true. It feels true, at least. Just one big cosmic joke, Klaus Hargreeves, eternal child, too scared to grow up. Like he's Peter-fucking-Pan._

_"I am honey. I didn't mean to upset you." Hands trace along his shoulders, come to rest against his ribs, and Klaus hurts there too. Breathing is a chore because he's never dealt well with humidity, with summer, and Vietnam feels like one endless vacation if holidays included the constant threat of death. Klaus hiccups, his grip tightening on the toilet again. Saigon is going to be the end of him, he thinks, and he'd welcome it. But only if Dave was there._

_Even with his eyes closed, he's spinning. A little top getting turned, a penny circling the end point of a drain. Every time he inhales, it echoes in his ears._

_"Dave," he can barely speak now. His throat hurts, and Klaus blames it on the vomiting, the way acid had burnt him open, "no more tequila." Klaus wants to make Dave promise—is making a promise to him._

_Hard to tell. Too hard to tell._

_"Klaus," Dave whispers back, a little reverent and a lot more serious. His fingers comb through Klaus's hair, tug lightly at his curls. It makes his head hurt more and Klaus groans around the blockage in his throat. Heaviness pricks at his eyes, and Klaus lets his head drop down deeper, lets the toilet bowl swallow him whole. Every movement steals him further from his body. He feels Dave leaning over his back, heavy and unyielding, "Klaus, you have to open your eyes."_

_"Dave, I'm tired," he whispers, and it's the truth; exhaustion weighs his bones down, leaves every part of him as dense as lead. Nothing is obeying him now. He's hungover and in pain, and all he can think about is his bed, the sweet relief of oblivion. Heroin would work just as well, or even a dose of ketamine._

_Is there anything in the world he hasn't done? Dave sighs and shakes his head; his hands grip tighter around Klaus's ribs, and they're hot as molten iron._

_"No, sweetheart, you need to open your eyes—"_

* * *

White spins into black and blue and brown again; Klaus can't breathe, he's too heavy, the earth is sucking him in. His body shakes, sweats. All he wants is something soft to rest on, but the tile is unyielding beneath him, gotten too slick.

"Klaus, Klaus, that's it, keep your eyes open," a hand on his cheek, more frantically moving across his body. It's so disconnected from him now, he doesn't know what he's feeling, who's touching him where "Klaus look at me—"

But he can't.

* * *

_"You look so perfect," Dave is saying, "my lovely boy." Klaus blinks; his head hurts. Above them, there is the sound of a bed smacking against a wall. The sound of a fist hitting skin. The sound of a gun going off in a rattle, a bum-bum-bump that Klaus knows better than the back of his own hand at this point._

_"Dave," he blinks, and there are sheets beneath him damp with sweat because this is Saigon and Vietnam are the home of humidity, that constant hot fog hug. This time he's face first in the pillow; Dave is above him, arms wrapped around his waist. It should be too warm, too much, but Klaus craves the skin-on-skin contact. He doesn't want to lose this._

_This time?_

_His head aches. He'd drunk too much. Tequila, vodka, whiskey, beer. Spirits before liquor, never been sicker. Dave kisses his temple, lips warm and breath smelling of spice. Klaus thinks of the bustling restaurant they'd gotten dinner at, the pho they'd both devoured like starving men. He wants to taste chillies on his lips again._

_"Don't stop," he murmurs, the words tangle on his tongue. Dave's eyes, he needs to see them, is trying to roll over, but he can't move. Dave's eyes are bright, brilliant blue, like the summer sky when it's cloudless and hotter than the devil's ass._

_"Didn't plan on it, sweetheart," Dave whispers, and Klaus feels the strangest sense of deja vu like he's already done this before. He's never been one for walking in circles. If you start spiralling, it's hard to find your way back out._

_"Dave," he whispers._

_And then Dave's voice in his ear, "You really need to wake up now,"_

* * *

"Shit, fuck. Klaus, stay awake this time, please—" someone is begging him, but Klaus can't seem to focus his eyes enough to make out their face. Every part of him is too hot; the scent of iron is in the air, metallic and familiar.

"I need bandages," a voice shouts from further away, "he's bleeding out—"

* * *

_"Dave! He's bleeding out!" Klaus is shouting, hands pressing down as tight as he can. Tiny chokes and gurgles beneath him, blood coming out his mouth, out the hole pierced through his chest. Blood shouldn't be coming out of him, Klaus thinks hysterically._

_It's all over his hands. Slippery and sticky all at once, burning like oil as it spills and spills. Klaus can barely breathe around the scent of it, how it fills his nose. It's like poison, like chemical gas. Klaus can't meet Tiny's eyes, thinks of how they'd been joking, how he owed Tiny a box of cigarettes, some dumb bet he can barely remember now that there's blood coating his hands. Too hot, bright red like gloves all up his arms, under his fingernails._

_Klaus wants to be sick._

_"Tiny, come on, I have you. Dave! Dave, he's bleeding out, help-" His voice feels hoarse as if he's giving every bit of himself to the pressure on Tiny's chest. Pointless, he thinks. So much death, and for what? A war that he knows should never have been fought._

_"Klaus, you have to let go," Dave is telling him, his fingers around Klaus's wrists, trying to pry his fingers away. Everything is too wet, glossy and viscous. Blood has an awful texture, one that lingers on the skin._

_"He'll die, Dave," it's a sob, a broken sound that leaves him. Dave squeezes his wrists a little tighter, and Klaus feels weak, fragile as a baby bird. He can't let go, he can't let go, or Tiny will die._

_"Klaus, oh honey, he's already gone," Dave is soft, unsticking Klaus's fingers one by one. On a whim, a horrible impulse decision, Klaus looks down._

_It's a mess. Scarlet and crimson and claret red all fighting over one another, a fucking brilliant Rothko in the middle of the Vietnamese jungle. Everything is soaked through, green fatigues, green foliage, all stained with blood. Tiny's eyes are wide open, empty now. All the life has been drained from him; it's covering every inch of the floor._

_"Dave, Dave, I tried," Klaus realises he's whimpering, repeating his words over and over. Hands clasp his own, and Klaus wants to vomit, wants to scrub himself clean._

_"I know, honey. I know. It's okay, Klaus, you did your best," Dave murmurs, drags Klaus close despite them being out in the open. The battle has already moved on around them, and Klaus knows they'll get in trouble for lingering, that they have to keep moving, but he's stuck. It's like he's glued to the spot._

_"I tried to save him," he whispers even as Dave works his gun into his shaky hands, knowing he won't be able to shoot it, no matter how hard he tries. Even if he managed to pull the trigger, he's shaking like a leaf in the middle of a storm; any bullet would go wildly off target._

_He's no Diego, after all._

_"I can't do this, Dave," he whispers, grief like a tidal wave in how it consumes him. How many men has he seen die? How many boys have been sent off to this jungle like sacrificial lambs?_

_"You can honey, you just need to let go," Dave tells him, sounding oddly serious and far away. Klaus wonders if it's just him, the rush of blood across through his head, dulling all his senses._

_"I can't," Klaus insists, and it's the truth. God, can't Dave see that it's the truth. When he looks up at the sky through the trees, it is a bright, brilliant, familiar blue._

_"You need to breathe, Klaus," Dave is so very distant now, Klaus stumbles as he tries to keep up, "open your eyes."_

* * *

He's gasping, but he can't seem to get air into his lungs, not before he starts to cough and god, there's that awful taste of iron on his tongue again. Can't they tell he's tired? He doesn't want to up and party right now, "Klaus," someone is calling his name, but Klaus just wants Dave's arms around him, he wants to sleep, "Klaus, you need to say awake, please, you're scaring us—"

* * *

_"You're one scary motherfucker, Spook," Dave laughs, throwing an arm around his shoulder, "sometimes I think you just don't give two shits about death at all. Walking into camp like that-"_

_"Man, the look on Bug's face when you punched Spook, he's twice your size. What made you want to take that guy on anyway?" Stack waves a beer bottle in Klaus's direction, an offering that Klaus takes with a crooked grin. Before he replies, he takes a long drink, covers his belch with his hand._

_God, being in the army, has made him uncouth._

_"Oh, he's just another dumb brute. And he cheated me out of what I paid for; he got what he deserved." He winks, knows they all know what he means. Smack is easier than expected to get out here, at least when the dealer wasn't acting out._

_Klaus had been an addict long enough to work out when he was being cheated. It's only now he has the confidence to say anything about it. Or maybe his patience is just worn thin, hanging on by a spider silk thread after god knows how long stuck in a warzone._

_"I thought you were gonna get wasted, Spook." Tennessee's familiar drawl is only half-muffled by the bottle he has held to his lips. He gets a punch in his shoulder for his words, Stack laughing loudly._

_"Nah, our guy is the scrappiest little shit in this unit. He can take on an asshole like Bug."_

_"Shut up, Stack. Don't act like you knew he could fight," Dave is a warm presence by his side, and Klaus elbows him - isn't Dave meant to uplift and defend him? Klaus is sure that's what boyfriends are for, after all. Just thinking of Dave as his boyfriend makes his stomach do an eager little flutter. The grunt he gets in return makes Klaus grin, lighting up a cigarette with a lazy hum._

_"Hargreeves fightin'? No, that was him kickin' ass." Tennessee laughs, his broad shoulders shaking as he mimes throwing a punch, missing Stack by a mile. It's all in good fun, Stack falling dramatically back on the floor and groaning as if he's really hurt. Of course, it's nothing like how the real fight went, Klaus thinks as he rubs the black eye he walked away with, but it's nice to have people supporting him._

_A team that has his back._

_"Oh, shut up," Klaus can't help but laugh, the conversation around him loud, echoing in his ears. He leans lightly against Dave, cigarette loosely gripped between two fingers, the cherry of it glowing a faint orange in the evening light._

_"I think you're officially one of the team," Dave says in his ear as Stack and Tennessee get distracted with their exaggerated play fight._

_"Yeah, looks like it..." Vietnam certainly isn't safe, but he feels a type of contentment here that he hasn't felt in a long time. Klaus knows his place, knows he has people who will fight for him, laugh with him, throw back a drink once the night is over._

_"That's why you have to let me go," Dave continues to speak, his voice quiet so that the others can't hear him. Confusion bubbles up inside of him, and the scene dulls to a sickly grey. When he looks down, there's blood on his hands again, the only colour he can suddenly see. Klaus looks up, tries to catch the blue of Dave's eyes._

_"This isn't right," he murmurs, insistent, but Dave won't look at him. He's barely looking at anything, and Klaus has blood on his hands and can't figure out where it's come from. Who's bleeding? He opens his mouth, needs to call for a medic, someone is hurt after all, and then Dave is looking at him._

_There's a sad smile on his face, a bloody scrape from temple to cheek that Klaus wants to kiss and bandage._

_"You need to let go, Klaus, stop holding on to this and—"_

* * *

"Wake up! Fucking hell, that's the third time, c'mon Klaus, keep your eyes open now. We've got you," there's a hand around his own, but it's too small - not Dave's at all. Dave has big hands that can cup both of Klaus's and make him feel secure, hands that are rough and calloused and used to a hard day's work.

"Dave," he grunts, his mouth dry and sticky. His tongue doesn't feel like his own; it feels like moss or fur has grown over it. How long has he been asleep, he wonders? Where is he now? Bright lights overhead are all he can see.

Iron fills his mouth, fills the empty cavity of his chest where his heart is barely beating. Why isn't Dave with him? Where is he? "Dave," he wheezes, and it feels hard to breathe. Klaus gasps and gasps, but he just can't get enough air; it's like his lungs aren't working the way they should be.

"Klaus, calm down,"

"He's going to crash again—"

* * *

_Klaus is walking through the jungle, and he is very alone. It's a strange thing. He's walked through the jungle hundreds of times now but never alone; he's always had his squad at his back. Now he's by himself, and the jungle seems ... wrong. Somehow silent. Eerily so. The wind has died down, the ever-present chitter of the trees has suddenly vanished, and when Klaus tries to look up at the sky, all he can see is dull green leaves._

_God, but it's warm. An oppressive heat that smothers him - almost as bad as the silence itself. He hoists his rifle higher on his back as he walks, has to keep walking so that he doesn't get ambushed, so he can find the rest of the 173rd. So he can find Dave._

_Where is Dave? Dave wouldn't have left him, not voluntarily, not without telling Klaus. Something must have happened. Klaus tries to remember, but his brain feels as thick as the humidity that surrounds him. He forces him to swallow down his fear—it tastes a lot like stomach bile, acidic and sour in the back of his throat. Dave will be okay, he tries to tell himself, he must be just ahead._

_He walks. He seems to walk endlessly, for hours and hours, yet the jungle never seems to change. It's green, hot, and silent. It takes him an unknown amount of time to realise that even the wailing dead aren't around today, but Klaus doesn't feel high. Just lonely and scared._

_"Dave," he calls out, leans against one of the trees that he still can't name. Tennessee can rattle the plants off like he's reading from a book, point out which ones are good for shelter and which ones will drop spiders on you without a second notice. Klaus's legs hurt now, a dull ache that's familiar to him after months in Vietnam. Walking for miles has become second nature._

_He gets no reply. Klaus doesn't want to close his eyes; he's ever so tired and ever so alone. Every time he looks around, the jungle seems to shift, and yet nothing changes—just miles and miles of plants that Klaus can't name and not a single other person._

_"Dave!" He shouts louder this time, his voice swallowed up by the leaves. Frantic panic is starting to build in his chest, sending lightning bolt signals down his limbs. Everything collects in his fingers and his toes, a mosquito bite itch that he can't ignore. Why is the jungle so quiet, so dark_ _—_

_When had it gotten dark? Suddenly Klaus realises it is night, and he is alone, and he is lost. No matter how hard he tries, he can't seem to catch his breath, choking on it like there's something in his throat. "Dave, Dave, please, where are you?"_

_He's shouting. Maybe he's whispering. Klaus can't tell over the rush of blood that seems to fill his ears, the way it fills his head and drowns out the silence. "Dave, please! Is this a joke? It's not funny, please don't leave me! Come back, where are you? Please!"_

_Words spill out of his mouth like a mantra; Klaus stumbles forwards blindly through the underbrush. Sharp stems and thorns cut at his arms, and he can't see, can't hear. In his chest, his heart pounds, and pounds, getting faster with every gasping breath he tries to take in. He falls. Klaus can't stop falling. Tumbling to his knees and they bruise on the jungle floor, his hands scrambling for some sort of purchase. He barely notices the sting on his palms, not until the scent of iron fills his nose._

_"Dave, please come back! I'll be good, please come back! Don't leave me here! I'm not scared anymore_ _—_ _"_

_He can't breathe. He's going to die out here in the jungle, boiling to death from the outside in. He can't breathe. He's going to die in the mausoleum, frightfully and painfully alone. He can't breathe; he can't breathe. Everything is muddling together in his head. God, he wants Dave back; why can't he have Dave back? Klaus feels tears leaking down his cheeks and can't pinpoint when he started crying, but he's sobbing now. "Dave, please," he tries to beg as if the universe has ever listened to him. Ever given him what he wants (except, he thinks, when it gave him Dave in the first place.)_

_And he still can't breathe._

* * *

"Klaus, you need to breathe," the voice by his ear sounds small and unbelievably sad. Klaus tries to breathe, ends up convulsing. Body jerking on the floor, once, twice, three times. It's like he can't get his mouth open, can't bring himself upright again. Something is stopping him. A force that wants to drag him back down into oblivion.

He realises his eyes are closed, his body sweats and sweats, and Klaus is terrified of the dark. Staying here makes him panic. Why can't he get up? He wants to get up. People keep talking to him, but their voices are muffled. No, not muffled; they're all around him but far too loud and indecipherable. Klaus doesn't know what they're saying. Just knows they won't fucking shut up.

Vietcong, maybe? Has he been captured? It's too hot. Klaus drags in another violent breath and chokes on it. Another shake like a seizure goes through him, and he realises there's another noise like a long, drawn-out moan.

It's him. It's him, groaning. His hands flail, smacking against the hard, hot floor. 

Dave. He needs to find Dave. Something must have happened, and he's all alone, sweat dripping down his forehead. Someone is touching him, and there's a mask being pressed over his face, but he doesn't want to be here.

Not if Dave isn't here. Where is he?

* * *

_It's hot in Saigon; every inch of him drips with sweat as Klaus wakes up with a start. His hands scrabble at the sheets, pat around blindly until they land on Dave's skin, exposed to the night air. He's there, right next to Klaus. Solid and firm the way a person should be. Breathing deep, he tries to ignore the way his chest is tight, tries to fend off the panic attack he's teetering on the edge of. Looking down into that familiar abyss is like looking into the opening of a bottle or out onto a vast yawning sea._

_Carefully, he drags his hand from Dave's skin and sits up, presses his head against the wall to try and feel something cool in the ever-oppressive heat. His other hand scrambles across the table by the bed until he finds both his pack of cigarettes and the lighter he'd left next to it. One great thing about the sixties is being able to smoke anywhere he likes whenever he wants. Another great thing about the sixties is Dave. Perfect, beautiful Dave._

_They'd left the lamp on because Dave is nothing if not accepting of all of Klaus's quirks. The good and the bad, he rolls with them all. It casts a dull orange glow across the room, highlighting the curved muscles of Dave's back, the broad planes of his shoulders. He blows out smoke and blinks roughly once, twice, realises he's crying, and he doesn't know why. Isn't this supposed to be good, a night to relax in? He can't tell any more. Every part of him has been scrambled, and now he's been put together backwards._

_There are days where he thinks he might take after his mother, a robot in all but name. One always misfiring, too many errors in his code. Ash falls from the cigarette in his hands, and Klaus realises he's shaking violently. Where the ash speckles his skin, it's hot too, shining sparks of pain that he can't ignore. He exhales again, watches the air curl in the stale air of the room, the way it casts shadows on the sickly yellow walls. It paints a picture, some abstract art that Klaus wants to understand the way critics understand a Pollock. Klaus has never been good at seeing the meaning, not unless he puts it there himself._

_With one hand, he reaches out and touches Dave again, a reminder that he's there. Everything feels out of place._

_"Hghhhgh-"Dave groans and then shifts, sit up. All of them are light sleepers now, ready to go at the crack of a whip, the sharp shot of a rifle. All at once, Dave is awake, and Klaus can only stare at him, his mouth drier than the desert despite how goddamn humid the room is. God, why is it always so hot? He's tired of dripping sweat down every crevice, finding himself soaked through at a moments notice. Speaking seems impossible now. Maybe it always has done._

_Dave looks at him, all strong jaw and blue eyes, and Klaus can't remember ever knowing another man like him. So stunning that he feels reverent, just looking at Dave. Knows what Wilde meant when he said love should be taken kneeling._

_"Klaus… are you? What's up?" Dave's voice is croaky with sleep, low enough that it would usually send shivers down his spine. Tonight, he just blinks, muted by his own body. The precipice of a panic attack looks ever more appealing, the way the sixth line of the night always looks ever more appealing—Klaus itches, not on the skin but somewhere deep in his bones. Nothing feels quite real, even though it should, and the lamplight flickers across Dave's face, changing all the details around. For a moment, Klaus sees his brother, his father, the mask-covered torturer who'd inadvertently sent him here. He takes in a sharp breath and then exhales it even quicker._

_God, he wishes the pin would just drop._

_There's nothing worse than sitting and waiting for that anxiety to spill over. Maybe there's another way to empty the glass, get rid of all the twisting feelings, but Klaus has only ever known how to push until the whole thing spills._

_"Do you ever have the feeling, like you're missing something? That you should be able to figure something out, but it's just out of reach?" He rolls over to look at Dave, catch his gaze. As always, Dave looks back with that same familiar blue. Klaus waves his hand as he speaks, sends smoke spiralling around the room, ash dotting the cheap blankets and eating away tiny holes._

_Maybe there are tiny holes in his brain. Like he's being eaten from the inside out, losing all those precious parts of himself. Something is wrong; Klaus can tell - he just can't figure out what._

_Beside him, Dave pulls himself up, rests on one elbow while tangling their free hands together. The touch should be grounding. Usually, when Dave touches him, it soothes all the rough edges of his body and helps him settle. Put two feet firmly back on the ground as it were. Tonight, he still feels lost, abstracted, and reduced and pulled apart._

_Klaus Hargreeves: Deconstructed. He could serve it at a restaurant, one of the fancy ones where people pay hundreds of dollars for a bite of a meal. Still, he squeezes Dave's hand back anyway because he doesn't know what else to do._

_"Like a word on the tip of your tongue?" he asks, his thumb swiping over Klaus's knuckles. Klaus counts them as they're touched: one, two, three, four._

_"I guess. But bigger," he eventually says, blowing smoke out of his mouth again - he doesn't remember taking a drag._

_"Bigger?" Dave asks the lamplight dancing across his face. Again, and again, his thumb rubs over his knuckles, and Klaus tries to focus on something else-the bed sheets tangled around his legs, the sounds of the city alive outside their window. Anything at all would do, but he can't._

_"God, Dave, I don't know! I just can't figure it out,"_

_"Klaus, honey, breathe," Dave doesn't move, keeps watching him, touching. Soothing. It's not helping, though, not when Klaus feels like he's put on his head backwards when the whole world is distorted through the smoke. There's so much of it now that it tinges the world grey, everything but Dave's face taking on a dull tone._

_"I'm trying," he murmurs, blinking as if it might clear the air. The cigarette should be nothing more than a stub by now, burning his fingers, but it hasn't changed. Is still smouldering away, leaking grey and red into his eyes._

_Dave doesn't move. Klaus wants him to, wants to be dragged closer into a kiss. Have Dave's arms wrapped around him in one of his hugs, warm and strong and safe. Wants to bury his face in Dave's chest and listen to his heartbeat, always steady, but Dave doesn't move._

_"You need to let go," his voice is kind as ever, and Klaus doesn't understand what he's saying, can only tighten his grip. Why would he let go of Dave? Dave is the only good thing he's ever had in his life, the light at the end of a long train tunnel._

_"I don't understand, Dave—"_

_"All these thoughts, they're hurting you. I'm hurting you, Klaus." Dave is never cruel, except now. When he speaks, he's firm and insistent, and it's wrenching his heart in two. Klaus feels tears spiking in his eyes, and he shakes his head._

_There's a futility in the movement._

_"What? No, Dave, you're not hurting me! You've never hurt me,"_

_"I am now Klaus. Look," Dave says, and Klaus does, looks down at where their hands are joined. Everything is red, bloody where they touch. It makes his stomach turn, and he forces himself to look back up at Dave, meet his eyes._

_"I don't understand. What's happening? Dave, please,"_

_"It's hurting you, Klaus. You need to let go. Let go of me and wake up—"_

* * *

This time there is screaming. Klaus bolts up to sitting, and the world pivots, throws itself off balance. He doesn't realise the screaming is him until it stops, his throat alight with pain. When he coughs, the room spins, he can see white and red and blue—the infirmary tent, he tries to tell himself.

Beneath his legs, the tile floor says otherwise. He needs to get up. Get out of here. Someone's hand clutches at his shoulder, but it's too small.

"Dave—!" he's wailing, looks down at his hands to see blood, far too much of it.

"Klaus, please, you have to calm down," a man (boy, he thinks, it sounds like a child, why is there a child in Vietnam—no, there's plenty of them around, far too many to count, Klaus wants to send them all home) is speaking, and his nails dig into Klaus's shoulder. Somehow the biting pain is grounding.

He hates it. Coughs, spits up vomit, and blood, thinks he might spit out his own teeth. 

When he looks down, there is blood covering his hands, his nails, every nook, and cranny of his knuckles. Klaus doesn't know where it's coming from. 

Dave.

Dave is—

Where is Dave? His head spins, splitting open like a dropped egg. Hands are touching him, someone trying to lie him down, but he needs to get up, find Dave. Find the rest of his squad. Anyone at all, Tennessee, Murphy, Tiny—

Tiny is dead. Dead with a capital D gone, bled out from a bullet. Maybe that's where the blood is from. Except—

Except that's already happened. Has someone else been hurt? He doesn't know, can't think at all.

"Klaus, please lie down," a girl is speaking, her voice raspy. Nurse, Klaus thinks, or something along those lines. Someone must be injured; else why would she be here? He tries to stand up, but his legs aren't obeying him, and another set of hands are touching him—bigger this time, too big. Klaus bats at them; it sends shock waves of pain like electric through his body.

"Let me go—" his voice is breathless, ripped open. Sweat drips down his forehead as he takes, in short, panicked breaths. All he can do is stare at his hands; they're red as the fucking ocean.

No. The ocean is blue.

Dave.

Dave's eyes. Blue as the ocean, blue as the summer sky. Klaus keens again, something itching at the back of his head. He tries to reach up to scratch it like there's something he's forgetting, but his body is swaying again. Limp, heavy, altogether too much. Why is he here? Where is here? It's hot, hot enough that he wants to cry as sweat leaks down his body, pooling like wax in the crevices he can't quite reach. 

But there's not the constant buzzing like he knows in Vietnam. The sound of the jungle and sixties lightbulbs jerry-rigged throughout their tents. All different buzzes united in some fucked up harmony, rarely interrupted by rifle fire. None of that, just the sound of people. And that noise is dulled and far away.

Maybe that's just him, all the blood rushing past his ears, getting lost on the way to his skull. He looks down again, sees the red of his hands, and suddenly he's shaking, wailing like a child. Always has been a child, eight years old, scratching his fingers raw against the stone door of the mausoleum. 

"Four p-please," the world flickers like a record jumping over a scratch. None of this is right. All Klaus can do is stare at his hands, the colour of them spilling out until it covers the whole goddamn world.

None of this is right. 

Klaus sways, and the world goes black again.

* * *

_"Why are you back here?"_

_Klaus looks around for the source of the words. He's—_

_He's in his cot, in his tent, in the jungle, in Vietnam. That's right. They'd played cards, all of them. Dave, and Klaus, and Murphy, and Tennessee, even Stack had joined in eventually, bribed into betting his coffee and cigarettes like the rest of them. It had been a good night. Plenty of drinks going around; he'd even managed to sneak a kiss off Dave when the rest of the squad had stumbled out for a leak._

_So why does his head hurt? Klaus squeezes his eyes shut, rubs his fingers across his forehead. It doesn't do much for the aching in his head. Sweat drips from the back of his neck, and he sighs, bites down on his tongue._

_"Oi, Spook, I'm talking to you! Why the fuck are you back here again?" someone says. Their voice is familiar. It grates on Klaus's nerves, the cold tone of it. Grey in all but colour. Not Dave's voice, that's for sure. Dave, who sounds the way that honey tastes, the way sunshine looks on buttercups and shit, he's turning sappy. When the fuck did that happen? He knows he's avoiding the topic of who's talking to him, but he can't help it—Klaus has run away his whole life._

_He looks up, and Tiny is stood there._

_Hole in his chest and all._

_It's practise that stops him from screaming. Sure, he's in a place where people would respond now—some of them would even care—but that's exactly why he swallows down his first reactions. After all, there's no need to wake up anyone else, not for a phantom only he can see. Not screaming is the easy part. It's harder not to whimper at the sight of Tiny, after all, stood there dripping blood, ugly as the day he died._

_Something Klaus has learnt over the years: very few people die pretty. Even models end up having a bad day when they peg it, turning blue and grey as all the life is sapped out of them. Death does no one any favours. One lone Vietnam soldier is no exception. Klaus bares his teeth and hisses from behind them. He flaps his goodbye hand at Tiny, the tattoo most apparent when he opens his hand._

_As usual, it doesn't work._

_"It's my cot," Klaus eventually says, voice dripping with disdain. Definitely not grief. At the very best, he'd call it sarcasm, and that's only because he's too tired to go full-on bitchy at god knows what hour in the morning. Two am? Three am? With his luck, it would be four._

_He doesn't look at the clock._

_"No, it's not," Tiny replies and Klaus has the familiar urge to throttle him. It wouldn't help. Tiny is already dead. There's nothing there for him to grip but the air itself, no matter how solid Tiny looks to him._

_"Yes, it is. I thought it took longer for ghosts to go cuckoo." It's evident that for all Tiny is talking and grouching like a human, he's already lost his marbles. Klaus had specifically made sure this was his cot. Just to make sure he checks anyway—he's right. It is his cot._

_In front of him, Tiny rolls his eyes and steps closer, just one careful movement across the floor. Klaus hisses again, scooches back on his cot until he's tucked into the corner of it, eyeing Tiny with a frown. It makes Tiny's face curl up in frustration and something else that Klaus can't name properly, a flickering behind his grey eyes. Something about that still doesn't feel right, but Klaus can't put a finger on why._

_"Don't look at me like that," Tiny huffs, crossing his arms over his chest. It doesn't do much to hide the residual ghost-blood dripping from his chest, but it does manage to hide the hole that had carried over with him to the other side. Nothing helps the blood smeared across his mouth and chin, though. It's not Tiny's fault that he doesn't know how ghosts affect him—hell, Dave barely knows how ghosts affect him, why he's so terrified._

_It doesn't stop the fear. And it definitely doesn't stop the guilt that spills out hot and heavy out of his stomach. If he'd been a little faster—_

_Klaus curls his hands into fists, remembers how it had felt on his fingers, sticky as glue and hot to the touch._

_"Like what?" he grinds out, blinking once, then twice. It does nothing to get rid of the stars behind his eyes, little white spots crowding for attention over his vision. Somehow, Tiny is in perfect clarity. Klaus hates the universe sometimes. Most of the time._

_For once, Tiny sounds upset; it's strange to hear." Like I'm going to hurt you, Spook. "_

_"If you recall, I still have a scar on my fucking arm because of you. "_

_"Yeah, well, ya kinda need physical teeth to bite someone, idiot. "Tiny rolls his eyes as he points at Klaus. Despite the truth of the words, Klaus isn't any less scared. Very little helps with the fear, except copious amounts of drugs._

_Except then he's still scared; he's just a little less cognizant of it._

_"Why the fuck are you here? Don't you have better things to do?" He waves a hand in Tiny's direction, trying his best to keep his voice down. Above him, the lightbulb is flickering, and he can hear Murphy snoring, loud and deep, so heavy that it practically rattles the whole tent. It's a miracle no-one has woken up yet._

_Vietnam doesn't exactly create heavy sleepers._

_"Don't you have better things to do?" Grey eyes stare at him unblinking. Do ghosts need to blink? Do their eyes get dry? Klaus has never bothered to ask. Then again, Ben never stared at him for quite so long._

_The thought of Ben makes him swallow, look away. He can practically imagine Ben's voice in his ear right now, begging him to come home but Klaus can't just up and leave. Not when the happiest he's ever been is wrapped up tight in Dave's arms. He swallows, wipes sweat away from his forehead._

_When he talks to Tiny again, his voice cracks halfway through his words. Klaus ignores the sudden pain in his throat in favour of frustration—getting angry at the ghosts is easier than trying to make sense of them._

_"What the fuck are you talking about? I'd like to get some sleep, but apparently, I have the world's most annoying ghost on my ass."_

_"C'mon Spook, I know you ain't this oblivious. You don't belong here. Stop fuckin' around now and get the hell out of this shithole."_

_"I'm not abandoning my—"_

_"Don't use the squad as your excuse."_

_"Fine. I'm not leaving Dave."_

_"Open your eyes, Klaus, and look around. He's not—"_

* * *

His eyes snap open, glance wildly around the room, but his vision is so blurry that he can't make out any features. White, red, glass, and tile. None of it adds up right. That's enough to make him choke on his tongue, trying to sit up, fingernails scrabbling for purchase on the floor. It's wet and sticky and hard enough he imagines himself snapping like a piece of charcoal when he presses down. 

"Tiny, you, fuck—" He needs to get up, needs to find Dave. His heart pounds like machine-gun fire in his chest, over and over, too fast. It doesn't stop; he can feel it in his brain. 

"Where the fuck is he? Dave! Dave, shit, why—stop it! Where is he?" Klaus shouts, and his voice is sandpaper, tearing up his throat. Hands grab at his arms, his wrists. Klaus does his best to jerk away, but there's no strength left in his limbs. He moves anyway. That desperate urge to break free is hard to ignore. 

"Klaus, fucking sit still—" One of the blurry figures shouts, deep-voiced. He should recognise it, Klaus thinks, but his head is too empty, too preoccupied. Once again, he tries to stand up, his legs fall out from under him.

Hands tighten around his wrists as he falls, pain shockwaves through his body. Klaus thinks about fences, electricity, the way a bolt causes your whole body to convulse. He's convulsing now, spit flying from his mouth. Maybe it's sweat, or tears, or some other mystery fluid. He wouldn't know; his eyes are already rolling back in his head.

In the ceiling, he can see stars. Maybe even Orion, belt wrapped around his hand and ready to fly. Klaus has scars across the back of his legs that would ache in abject sympathy if he could feel his legs.

His twenties had been an interesting time.

"He's going to pull those bandages off." Another voice mutters, cracking on the words.

"I can see that!" The first man snaps back; it reminds him of the cracking of a belt, the way leather sounds against bare skin.

"Don't snap at me!"

"Can you two stop?" Person three sounds sad, voice low. Slow. Chop chop, Klaus thinks, no time for hanging around. He's on a mission, got a soldier to find. 

The grip around his wrist eases. Klaus draws in a rattling breath, chainsaw revving to cut down a tree. No matter how hard he tries, he can't seem to suck enough oxygen in. Oh well. He's done more on less, Klaus tells himself (maybe he's lying, there's no one around to tell him otherwise.)

When he twists, it's unexpected enough that he manages to free himself. Though his legs still feel like lead, he sweeps one of them out, thanks Daddy for the training in the most sarcastic voice he can muster. If he says it out loud, there's no one around to judge him for it. Across from him, the figure stumbles backwards with a crash, Klaus scrambles back along the floor. Coughs. Tastes iron on his mouth. 

"Shit." The younger voice mutters. Klaus nicknames him Serious in his head. He seems to be the most in control despite sounding like a child. Not like he hasn't seen weirder.

"What the fuck?!" Erupts from the other side of the room. Presumably, the one he'd kicked. Klaus has begun to think of him as Angry Man because he sounds pissed at the world. Well, good riddance, he thinks, around trying to remember to breathe. Why is breathing so hard right now? He looks up again. Stars litter the ceiling. In the middle of it is one big, flickering light. Staring into the sun has never been more appealing.

Klaus groans.

Sad Man is trying to get closer. Klaus hisses in response to his words, the nervous, placid tone. "Klaus, please calm down. You're hurting yourself—" 

"Himself? He just fucking kicked me," the squabbling makes his head hurt and Klaus groans, rolls over onto his side. When he coughs, it sends bloody red spatters over the floor again, coming up out of his mouth like painted glass shards.

"Get over it—"

"Klaus? Klaus! Shit, he's bleeding again!" Sad Man gets louder. When he moves, his shadow is huge, blocks out half the light of the room. His presence seems to muffle out angry and serious.

"How about you make yourself useful and get a suture kit?"

"You're the one who can tele—"

"Go!"

"Fine!" Stomping fills the room, and then the sound of a door crashing closed, shaking the building. Klaus blinks, tries to remember when the tents had gotten doors. Doors and tile floors.

Fuck.

Strange, he thinks in the middle of all this, how much the stupid voices remind him of his family. Strange and impossible too—as far as he knows, he's the only Hargreeves in Vietnam.

It's the last thought he has before the sun flickers out again, sends him plunging into darkness.

* * *

_Klaus wakes up in the dark. Not the type of dark where you're on the streets, and there's still a light coming from the neon advertising of the shops and the lamp posts no matter how deep the alley you've secluded yourself in. And not the type of dark he knows from the jungles of Vietnam, where dulled light can infiltrate every corner, and there are always stars staring down between the leaves of the jungle trees._

_No. This dark is familiar and all-consuming._

_Klaus knows where he is before he even tries to look around._

_Beneath his cheek, the stone floor is wet with sweat and tears, and Klaus curls his knees up to his chest, the dank air of the mausoleum making it hard to breathe. The smell of rot is worst when it's hot. Cold preserves, but heat breaks down into bodies that fall apart at just a look and the sickly sweet scent of decay. It's a taste that sticks to the tongue._

_Klaus coughs as if it might clear his throat, but he doesn't try to get up. There's no point. No-one ever lets him out of the mausoleum. He's stuck, stuck, stuck as a nail in centuries-old wood, surrounded by death._

_If he keeps his eyes shut, at least he doesn't have to see the dark. At first, he tries to breathe in through his mouth, but it doesn't help his rising panic; it just fills his throat with damp. He goes through his nose instead after that, but it's not much better. Klaus wishes he didn't have to breathe at all, wishes he could just break free, but he's not strong enough. Has he ever managed to be strong on his own? He doesn't know. He does know._

_The world spins behind his closed eyes. Even with them shut, he can still see the ghosts; they're always there. Have been as long as he can remember. Well, since he was eight at least, and thrown into hell for the first time. C’est la vie, he thinks. What's done is done. Only, it's hard to be blasé when all he can think about is old Eric with his jaw blown off and his eyes dark and leering. Klaus doesn't know if that's his name; he'd just come up with one at eight years old and stuck with it—it's not like he could ask the ghost with a gaping hole where his mouth could be, and honestly?_

_Klaus is glad that Eric can't talk. His looks were bad enough._

_Now he has his eyes shut, but he can still see Eric and Louise and poor little Anna who'd cried and cried and cried no matter how much Klaus had begged her to stop. He covers his ears, but it does nothing to drown out the sounds of them. Sweat drips down his face, leaving his hair matted and damp, hanging over his eyes. Klaus presses his hands tighter to the sides of his head and keens despite knowing it won't help. Nothing ever helps here._

_Not unless he can prove himself, but he's always too scared. Always too much of a disappointment. Sorry Dad, sorry family, sorry little girl God on a bike. If he was a little braver, he'd open his eyes, but it's like someone has glued them shut. Klaus can't force them open now. Not until the door opens and breaks through the dark._

_Why the fuck does it have to be dark?_

_"I'm sorry," he whispers and thinks it's out loud this time. It won't do anything. Dad doesn't accept apologies, only changed behaviour. Klaus finds him whispering them anyway, as long as no-one will hear. At least he can hear even if he can't forgive himself. He presses his palms against the floor, and the stone feels hot like smouldering coal, like the burning barrel of a gun. There's the taste of iron in his mouth and the burning sting of bile._

_He turns his head to vomit, but nothing comes up. Again, the world spins. Klaus puts his palms against the floor and imagines catching alight like a dry forest catching fire: suddenly, all at once. His heartbeat spit-bang-smacks through every pulse point, and Klaus wonders if this is it—if this is how he finally implodes._

_No, he didn't want to die, but he wanted to be anywhere but here. Here in the mausoleum. How had he even ended up in the mausoleum? Wasn't he too old for this? He was meant to be somewhere else; Klaus was sure of it._

_How old was he? Twenty-nine. Thirty? Thirteen? Eight?_

_He couldn't think straight. Klaus couldn't breathe. He tried to inhale, but the heavy scent of rot made him choke, tickled the back of his throat until he was gasping and then sobbing. Why was he here? Heat trickled down into the base of his spine, spilling up from his palms with every stabbing beat of his overworked heart._

_Why was he back here? Where was—_

_Where was Dave?_

_"Dave," he croaks out, sky blue flashing through his mind's eye, like the glint of a knife in the dark. When he tries to shift, it pulls at every ache in his body, his legs numb and far away. The shrapnel scar in his shoulder aches, a tiny supernova in the breaking down galaxy of his body, and all Klaus wants to do is be free. All he wants to do is sleep. He coughs, and it tastes like three-day-old cigarettes and bile._

_"Klaus," someone murmurs, and he hopes it's not Louise with her straw blond hair, lips as pale as snow. The first time Klaus had seen her, he'd thought she was a princess, pretty in her white gown even if it was stained with splatters of red. Now he knew better. She had never been a princess, just another lost soul desperate to feel something._

_"G' 'way," he thinks he's biting on his tongue; that's why he can't get the words to come out right. No matter how hard he tries, he can't unstick his teeth from each other. Klaus imagines biting his tongue off completely. Imagines swallowing it whole._

_"Klaus, honey, it's okay. You're not really here."_

_The voice is a familiar, sweet southern drawl. If he opened his eyes, Klaus can picture perfectly what he'd see. The blue of Dave's eyes, the way they drown him, the knife's edge of his jaw that Klaus would gladly cut himself on again and again. A choked sound escapes him, and Klaus thinks that there may be tears running down his cheeks, but it could just be sweat. God knows it's hot enough. And God knows he's been crying for the last two decades straight._

_"Dave," he whispers but doesn't dare to hope. If Klaus is in the mausoleum, he's alone but for the dead. Which means Dave can't really be here unless Klaus has cracked completely._

_Floor: one. Klaus's eggshell sanity: zero._

_"Oh, kitten, you can open your eyes. None of this is real," the figment of Dave is trying to be comforting, but Klaus can't hear it—or at least he doesn't want to hear it. Dave is nothing more than some hallucination he's conjured up to try and help him through this ordeal, but he's not helping. Klaus just feels worse. He tries to ignore the voice, breathing in short, sharp gasps through his nose._

_"Klaus, c'mon, you have to trust me. You're not really here," Dave is still talking. Klaus imagines him kneeling down beside him, hands carding through his hair. Head massages had been one of Dave's many talents, but mostly it had been about touch, being grounded by Dave's fingers pressed against his skin._

_Dave doesn't touch him now (because he's not real, Klaus's traitorous brain reminds him), but he keeps speaking. "Honey, you need to breathe."_

_And then:_

_"Come on, Klaus, I know you can do this."_

_"You're so strong; all you need to do is open your eyes. Can you do that for me?"_

_"Sweetheart, I'm right here with you, I promise,"_

_"It's okay, Klaus, none of this is real, and even if it was, I wouldn't let them hurt you."_

_On and on with the reassurances in that same soothing tone, the one Dave always used when he was bringing Klaus down from a nightmare or a particularly awful high. Three days on speed in the Vietnamese jungle never did anyone any good. And there had been the flashbacks too, once in a club bathroom, twice in their motel room when he'd cried for two hours straight, and he still couldn't remember why the tears had started, but Dave had been there the whole time._

_And the figment of Dave is here now. Surely that's better than nothing._

_"I can't," he whispers, despite the soft words._

_"You can," Dave promises back. Klaus thinks of leaves rustling, the sound of footsteps on jungle floors._

_"I'm not strong enough," he says. In his heart, he knows it's the truth. His palms slide overheated stone, and Klaus thinks of summer, hates the way the sun scorches down on everything, even where dead things should lay untouched. Is it even day, he wonders, or has night already fallen? In the darkness of the crypt, the damn mausoleum walls, it's hard to tell. The stone, as always, gives away no secrets. Must have been why Dad liked it. Klaus tries to laugh, but it comes out as a sob._

_He misses his family. Wonders if they miss him too, the way you miss a manicure once you've fucked it up, the way you miss the wedding china when you drop it. Sad but with minimal impact. Do they know where he is?_

_They're not here now to save him. The only one here is the Dave that Klaus has imagined. He swallows down rot. Tries to focus on his voice._

_"Klaus Hargreeves, I've seen you try and walk off a broken leg in order to help your squad. I've seen you lead us through a minefield without blinkin' an eyelash. Sunshine, you fought in the Vietnam fuckin' war. I promise you, you're strong enough." Through it all, Dave's voice doesn't crack. It's steady, serious._

_Then again, why would he imagine a Dave who was anything less than perfect?_

_"You don't understand. It's not the same." It's pointless to argue, Klaus thinks. He's just arguing with himself, circling again. There are vultures in the sky, and he's nothing but the corpse they're waiting to peck on. One of these days, he's going to lose his liver for good._

_Wrong bird, a voice suspiciously like Ben's says, but Klaus shoves the figment of Ben away—doesn't his imagination see he's already summoned one protective spectre to help him through this. He doesn't need a ghost too._

_"No. No honey, it's not. But I believe in you anyway."_

_"Dave," he whispers. Klaus can't think of anything else to say. Sweat drips down his neck, and tears spill over his cheeks. Dave always thought too much of him, convinced that Klaus was more than what he was—which was trash. Covered in glitter and rhinestones, maybe, but trash nonetheless. And now he'd been discarded again, left out in the heat to rot._

_Just another dead soldier._

_"Oh, Klaus, honey. You just need to open your eyes; you'll see. None of this is real."_

_Klaus swallows down the taste of decay and iron. He presses his palms against the floor. Hello, Goodbye. Fitting because he doesn't know if he's coming or going right now. He knows where the floor is, but only because he's lying on it, stuck like a needle to a magnet. The mausoleum is his haystack, and he's forever trapped inside of it._

_"I don't want to see them," his voice is hoarse even to his own ears._

_Klaus, Klaus, Klaus. It's all the dead scream. Even when they're not around, he can hear it, the constant ringing of his name. PTSD, people, had called it in the past. He didn't like to think of himself as traumatised—it was easier to just say fucked up._

_"There's no-one here but us," Dave promises, but he can't know that because he's just a shade that Klaus has imagined, and even in life, he'd never been able to see ghosts. Klaus is awfully unique, and it's always sucked ass._

_"Don't lie to me,"_

_"I'm not, sweetheart."_

_"There are always ghosts in the mau—" here, his breath cuts off; Klaus feels the blockage like hands around his throat, squeezing tighter every time he tries to inhale._

_"Breathe, Klaus." Somehow, the instruction helps. Dave's voice unpicks the locked together mechanisms of Klaus's body, soothes the panic that had seized him—oil on the gears. Klaus nods. Opens his mouth to try again._

_"There are always ghosts here," he reminds Dave, which is really reminding himself. Because Dave isn't here. Dave can't be here._

_"It's just us," it's another promise._

_"I'll see them. They'll see me."_

_"They're not here, kitten. You don't have to see them," Klaus imagines Dave stepping closer, sitting on the floor opposite him. Dave's good like that, Klaus thinks, a steadying presence whenever Klaus's brain was racing around in his own head, setting his body on fire. He's on fire again now, burning up into ash._

_"I saw Tiny," he swallows, once again his throat feels dry. There's moisture seeping out of every inch of him, apart from where he needs it to be._

_"I know," Dave says because this Dave is just something his fevered brain has imagined to keep him calm, and Klaus hates how it's working. Hates how he can breathe a little easier if he thinks of Dave being there for him. Awful. Co-dependent. Desperate._

_Whatever, he tells that stupid self-hating part of himself that sounds more like Reginald than anything else. As long as it works, he's not going to complain._

_"He was acting weird. Kept asking why I was still around. Like in camp, I guess. Or in Vietnam? It was weird." Talking at least drowns out the voices in his head, the way they echo endlessly. In the dark, they get louder._

_Sometimes he ends up screaming to drown them out. Who's the ghost then? He doesn't know._

_"What were you doing?"_

_It's a stupid question. Klaus can't figure out why it's being asked. Dave knows. Dave has to know._

_"You know! You know Dave. I got stuck." He wants to roll onto his back as if it might help him breathe in the humidity, but he can't move. Klaus is a stone embedded in the earth—trapped._

_"And then you stayed." Klaus loves Dave, but he's beginning to hate the sound of his voice. No. No, he could never hate anything about Dave. The real Dave, that is. This figment he's dreamt up is what he hates, the way it speaks to him and yet he craves it in equal measure, doesn't want Dave to leave._

_Yeah, he stayed. Dave knows why he stayed. Hell, Klaus definitely knows why he stayed. It had been the happiest he'd ever been. "With you. For you!" he yells and knows he's only repeating it to himself._

_"But you're not there any more," Dave says quietly._

_"No," Klaus replies with a strangled laugh, "I'm somewhere much worse."_

_Vietnam was infinitely preferable to the hellhole that is the mausoleum, the gaping maw that threatens to swallow him up time and time again._

_"Are you? I think you need to have a better look around, Klaus."_

_"I can't. I can't see them." He can't open his eyes, not when his demons haunt him around every corner. They linger, hungry for a piece of him._

_"You can. You're strong enough," Dave is insistent, unfailingly so. Klaus should have expected that Dave has never given up on him. Dragged him through the mud and guts of the Vietnamese jungle, helped him eat when Klaus was shaking too hard to hold a spoon, held his hair back every time he got sick—which was often—but never once given up on him._

_No, every time the going got tough, Dave dug his heels in and refused to go away. It was pathetic how much Klaus loved him for that. Wasn't he supposed to be an independent man?_

_"Why are you doing this to me?" The words slip out as a pained whine that tears up his throat. Klaus curls up tight tries to press his forehead against the ground as if it might give him some relief. It doesn't; the stone still burns him like before._

_Klaus forgives it; he'd burn himself too, given a chance._

_Dave's voice moves around him. Behind his eyelids, Klaus can imagine him walking around the room, pacing as he thinks. "Sweetheart, I'm just trying to help," he says eventually._

_It doesn't help. Klaus only feels worse. Now he's disappointing Dave too, and this Dave is nothing more than something he's dreamt up to keep himself sane. Maybe his brain should have imagined Reginald; at least he was used to disappointing his father._

_"It's not—I'm not," he gasps, drags his nails along the ground, "I'm not strong enough," Klaus repeats, it tastes like ash on his tongue._

_"Klaus, sunshine, open your eyes for me,"_

_"Why does everyone keep telling me to do that? Tiny said—"_

_"Klaus," Dave interrupts, gentle but firm._

_Frustration bubbles under his skin, and he blows out a stream of air from between pursed lips. "Fine!"_

_Klaus opens his eyes._

_Klaus opens his eyes, and the world swims in shades of grey._

_Klaus opens his eyes, and Dave is standing there, feet not touching the ground, blood spilling and spilling out of the blown-out hole in his chest. Bullets rip through the air. Klaus's heart stops like it's been torn apart too. He can't catch his breath, no matter how hard he tries. Around him, the world is a roar of machine-gun fire and screams echoing through the dark._

_"Dave," he gasps just once._

_The ghost that had once been the man he'd loved steps closer, blood drips down his chest, is smeared across his face._

_He doesn't think twice before throwing himself back—when his head connects with the stone wall of the mausoleum, it hurts in the same way as an overdose._

_That is to say, it feels like relief._

* * *

Klaus isn't awake until the moment his head connects to the tiles with an awful crack, and then the rest of the world goes silent. When he opens his eyes, the world is spinning red and white, and he can't fucking breathe. Klaus opens his mouth, and all that comes out is a scream, a wild animal noise. Some prey animal dying a slow and painful death.

"Dave! Dave, no, no, you can't, no—!" he finds himself babbling, stumbling backwards up the wall. All he can see is the ghost of Dave behind his eyes. Everywhere he looks, Dave is there, dripping with blood. By the time he manages to get half stood up, his stomach is turning again. Klaus takes in a breath that feels like being shot and vomits.

All he can taste is iron.

"Klaus! Klaus shit, you need to calm down."

He ignores the voice, more intent on dragging himself away from wherever this is and finding Dave because Dave can't be dead. Klaus won't let that happen. Just a bad dream, he tries to tell himself, some horrific nightmare that he can't seem to shake. Sweat drips down his neck again, but Klaus ignores that too.

"Fuck off, let me go," he doesn't know if he's shouting or whispering. Every part of him feels like tissue paper, thin and fragile with despair. If he looked down at himself right now, Klaus wouldn't be surprised if you could see right through him.

His legs shake when he tries to walk on them, but Klaus draws all his energy into himself. Dave always said he was stronger than he thought; he draws on that energy now. In the corners of his eyes, Dave hovers like a dead thing. Another keen slips from between his lips. He's trying his best to be strong.

"Klaus, you need to sit down," hands reach out towards him, covered in blood, and Klaus screams. His heart spills up out of his throat. Every sound is like a turret going off, that familiar bum-bum-bump that leaves your skeleton shaking. All Klaus can see is Dave, blood staining the white of his teeth, the blown open china of his ribcage.

Panic grips him, spurs him forwards. Funny, he thinks with a strangled sound (sob? laugh? He doesn't know), how he always seems to blossom under the worst type of pressure. Maybe all he's ever been is a piece of coal; maybe he never wanted to be a diamond.

The hands are still reaching for him. Klaus sweeps his arms out to throw them out of his path and bolts. Sweat trickles down his back, hot and sticky, and maybe it's not sweat at all. God knows his head is killing him, maybe he's cracked for real this time, all his bones shattering under the weight of the world—he's never been Atlas after all.

Klaus makes it one step, two, three, four. Somehow he manages to avoid the figures grasping at him, and he wonders if he's the ghost now. As visible and tangible as smoke. More likely, he just has the power of surprise on his hands. He reaches the door and tries to burst through it; it creaks under his weight, hinges weak.

And then he's out, but there's no freedom to be found.

"Shit—!"

"Fuck, Klaus, get back here,"

"Where's he going, Klaus, please!"

"Someone grab him!"

The voices intermingle, getting louder and louder. Klaus thinks of Sarge shouting orders over the sound of distant bombs going off, the non-stop shutter of machine gunfire. He's going to get told off for losing his rifle if he manages to survive this at all. Footsteps follow after him, smacking against wooden floors, and Klaus scrambles to get his bearings, but the whole world is tilting back and forth.

Klaus has been on a boat once, and this is what the waves had felt like: an impossible force to escape; an uncaring monster playing with its food; a reminder of how small he was; a see-saw rocking back and forth.

He wonders if he's on a boat now because all he craves is dry land. He has to keep moving forwards, he tells himself, is so preoccupied that he doesn't see the stairs until he's falling. One missed step, and he's going down piece by shattered piece.

_Huh_ , he thinks as he falls, _this too feels familiar._

Around him, the noise becomes an uproar, a cacophony of sound from every angle. He thinks the world might be shaking white alternating with blue, but that could just be the free fall, then learning how to fly. Maybe they're under enemy fire, and he's once again useless a constant disappointment. Klaus tries to turn, to focus.

For a moment, he sees her, Vanya, in all her shining glory.

He tries to open his mouth to say her name, but it's too late. Klaus is out before he hits the floor.

* * *

_No, is the first thing Klaus thinks when he opens his eyes. Followed shortly by holy fucking shit as he ducks his head behind cover, face pressed to the hot jungle floor. It's dark again. Or at least it's night time. Calling it dark is an overstatement; the world is lit up by bursts of gunfire and explosions that cut through the evening like a knife._

_"Wish Diego was here," he mutters under his breath, tries to settle into the rhythm of the turrets as they rattle. Each bomb that drops echoes through his body and makes his toes tingle._

_"Ya say, somethin' Spook?" Tennessee yells from behind him. Klaus waves Goodbye and rolls his eyes, trying to bring the world into focus. Speed makes his vision blur, shows him double everywhere he looks—probably means he took too much, but today has been loud and too full of ghosts for Klaus to concentrate._

_Another thump like the beat dropping, his head spins. Green and white and red merge together into some acid drop rave, where the music is loud enough to forget your own thoughts. Klaus would know; he's been to enough of the damn things, young and high off his tits on whatever party candy he can get his hands on._

_More stuttering gunfire. He thinks of Diego trying to form words around a traitorous tongue and thinks of seizing in the back of an ambulance. All his feelings blur together in the jungle, put in a blender and forced to mingle. He blinks again, looks up, reloads his gun. Sweat drips down his back, pooling at the base of his spine, so much of it, he feels like he's bathing in the damn stuff._

_Klaus looks up again. The jungle lights up white. It feels all too familiar._

_"Fuck Davey, s'like we've done this all before. Fucking jungle is all the same," he shouts as he aims his gun with shaking hands, no idea who he's shooting at. Aren't they at the front tonight? All he has to do is fire._

_Beside him, Dave doesn't answer. That's fine. Probably didn't hear him over the roar of the jungle, hell the rush of his own blood in his head. He gets it, Klaus does; he knows what it's like to be oblivious to the world around you. In the dark, the jungle wavers, Klaus pulls the trigger on his gun and lets the shot rebound through him._

_One more. Another. He reloads._

_The world wavers, stuttering like a tape that's gotten tangled in the stereo._

_"I swear, major déjà vu!" his voice is hoarse, his throat hurts—too many cigarettes, not enough water. Not much to do about it. All he can do is keep firing. Once, twice, reload. He feels like he's reloading too often, but his hands move without him thinking._

_Once again, Dave doesn't reply, is strangely silent next to him. As silent as one can be in the middle of a battle at least and Klaus inhales roughly through his nose, ducks his head down as the world spins. He presses a hand against the ground as he tries to get his bearings, and the earth is so hot it burns. The humidity smells like gunpowder, all sulfur and ash._

_God, he's tired._

_Why does he feel like he's done this before? Been doing it for a long time._

_"Get it together, Hargreeves," he tells himself. It's just another battle, just another day in the fucking hellscape that is Vietnam and all he's got to do is get through it. Klaus looks down, and there's blood on his hands. Just another day._

_His stomach turns despite how he tries to reassure himself. "C'mon, you can fucking do this, Klaus."_

_Above his head, bullets fly, a bright deadly rain, he pokes his head up and tries to take a shot, but his hands slip like butter on the trigger. No matter how hard he tries, Klaus can't make sense of the world. There's a beat pounding in the back of his head, and truthfully he's scared. He's fucking terrified. No matter how he tries to spin it, fear makes his fingers tremble, and he's got this awful feeling like something bad is going to happen._

_Maybe it already has._

_Time slows as he sees death coming for him; for a moment, he can't seem to move, Hello and Goodbye clamped tight as he can get them around his gun. And then, at the last minute, he slides out the way, all of Daddy's training coming into play. He gasps for breath and turns, bleary-eyed, to look at Dave for the first time._

_"Whew!" he blows out the exclamation like a breath, "Christ on a cracker, that was a close one, huh, Dave?"_

_Klaus is speaking without thinking, mouth as dry as parchment paper that's been left out too long in the sun. And then his vision finally focuses, and he can see._

_Dave._

_Dave ripped apart, hole in his chest, eyes wide and practically empty. Around him, the world swims; Klaus chokes on his heart, it must be that because something has jumped up to his throat and cracked there. He wants to touch his own chest because if one of them is dead, it must be him, right?_

_Right?_

_"Dave, look at me," he whispers; it feels like reading off a script. He inhales through his nose and tastes iron. Before he realises it, his hands are on Dave's chest, "look at me, okay?"_

_He can't cry. Not now. Not when the heat of the jungle is sapping all his strength, not when all the colour is being sapped from the world but red. Blood coats his hands, sticky as glue, and Klaus doesn't think he'll ever be free of that sensation, the way it wraps around his fingers like a glove._

_"Look at me."_

_Klaus's tongue is caught against his teeth. The words are his. He knows the words are his, and yet he's not the one talking; he can't be. He doesn't want to be here, watching Dave die, that was never the intention. "Look at me," echoes again. The voice makes him want to wail in time with the shaking of the earth, and it's impossible to ignore._

_So he does as he's bid and looks up. Sat to the left of his own body is Dave, blood still trickling from the corners of his mouth. This time Klaus does wail, he screams like he's been shot himself._

_"Medic, please—" he cries out and knows it's hopeless, his hands slip across Dave's chest. Everything is hot still. If it wasn't for the hole emptying out his chest, he could imagine Dave was still alive, but Dave's ghost is sat across from him looking impossibly, achingly sad._

_"Klaus, you're hurting yourself," Dave says, Klaus can hear him with perfect clarity despite the roaring of the battle around them. It's like the whole world has faded into the background, and now it's just the two of them. A sob wrenches its way out of his throat; it's a shaky, drawn-out thing. Now the tears fall, one by one, down his cheeks. He doesn't think anyone will notice._

_"Klaus," Dave speaks again, "you're hurting yourself. You need to let go."_

_The world is grey, swimming in and out of focus, and Klaus is underwater with the weight of his grief, unable to bring in air. Why doesn't Dave understand? He can't go. He'll always be stuck on this battlefield watching Dave die. No matter how hard he tries to run, he ends up back here. He's been here before._

_He's done this before._

_God, it still hurts so much._

_"I can't," he gasps, "I can't let you go."_

_"You can. You have to Klaus," Klaus imagines Dave's hands in his hair, remembers how it had felt to have Dave's body pressed up against his. Never in his life had he felt love like that. Never in his life had he been so adored. And now Dave is dead, and Klaus is alone. Again._

_And no-one even knows what they'd shared, that connection that had sent sparks down his spine, that had lifted up his very soul. Klaus hadn't even believed in his soul until he'd bared it to Dave._

_"Who'll remember us if I let you go? Who'll remember this? I can't lose—" he cuts himself off, talking about it burns his throat, his lips wobbling. Every part of him is broken. That's the thing about love; it shatters you. That's the thing about grief; it scatters all the pieces, so you can't put them back together._

_Klaus looks up, stares into the blue of Dave's eyes. He doesn't want that colour to fade. Every time he looks up at the sky, he wants to think of Dave every time he sees the ocean._

_"You won't forget," Dave whispers, "even if you let go, you won't forget."_

_There's a confidence in his voice that Klaus doesn't have. At twenty, he'd forgotten his own name. At twenty-one, he'd forgotten briefly how to speak English. At twenty-six, he'd forgotten how his mother wore her hair, didn't remember again until he was twenty-nine and back at home for the first time in over a decade._

_He can't forget Dave, god knows he'd rather die. He doesn't say this, Klaus has a feeling that Dave already knows._

_"You'll be alone. I'll be alone," he says instead, voice raw. When he looks up, the whole world is just a drag of grey on grey, the sky spinning._

_Dave had held him whenever he'd cried. Dave had picked him up every time he'd stumbled, no matter how often, no matter the reason why. The memory of hands on his shoulders makes him choke up. Sweat drips down his chest, and Klaus curls his fingers up, they stick together, all glossy and wet with blood._

_"You're not, Klaus, you're not alone." Klaus breathes in again._

_Thinks of Diego taking him to a bar for Vet's and barely asking why. Five, travelling through time to save the world but mainly to save his family—Klaus included. He thinks of Ben, a constant by his side, harsh and sympathetic in equal measure, punching pills from his mouth the moment he had a chance. Ben had always been more protective over Klaus's health than Klaus himself. How many times had that saved his life?_

_Klaus doesn't know._

_There's Allison, sharing her make-up and skirts whenever Dad had been looking away, paying for rehab time and time again as if she might be able to save him (she never had. She had more times than Klaus could count). Vanya, playing her violin whenever the screaming got too loud, giving him something to focus on whenever he was drowning in the dead._

_Even Luther. Arms around him during flashbacks, going through grapples time and time again until Klaus could get free. He'd never been able to knock Luther out, but goddamn, he knew how to beat down a guy twice his size—that had come in useful more than once._

_He's not alone._

_Even so, it's not the same._

_Klaus shakes his head, tries to breathe. His nails cut bloody half-circles into the tender flesh of his palms, tearing up Hello and Goodbye until Klaus thinks he might just scream again. Everything has gone strangely quiet now, all signs of the battle having faded away bar the trembling of the ground._

_And Dave's body. Can't fucking forget that Klaus thinks, breathing in a cry and exhaling a hysterical, broken laugh that echoes through the jungle._

_"This has already happened. I don't want—make it stop, please. I don't want to watch you die. Why am I seeing this again?" He closes his eyes as if it might save him from this nightmare of a day. It doesn't because it's already happened, and Klaus is just wandering a sphere, cursed to always end up in the same place._

_His liver hurts. Klaus curses eagles, and the president who'd sent them wishes they'd rip him to pieces sooner._

_"I can't make it stop, Klaus. You know why," Dave sounds sad. Klaus bites on his cheeks, but he's already tasting iron, so it does nothing to help, doesn't distract him from the pain._

_"I can't. I can't lose you again." But he's already lost him. Will always have lost him. Klaus drags his hands away from the broken form of Dave's body and wails, clamping his hands over his ears. It smears blood down his face, but Klaus doesn't care; he can't listen to this any more._

_He barely fucking wants to exist. Let him sink back into the earth. Just let him join the hordes of broken dead, it's what he deserves._

_"Klaus." Despite the hands over his ears, he can still hear Dave. That's not surprising, but Klaus still hates it, hates hearing that soft, upset tone in his words. The same one he used whenever Klaus tried to push him away, the same one he used when Klaus overdosed on leave or spat angry words because he couldn't handle his own goddamn emotions._

_Dave is entirely too empathetic, even the one that just exists as a ghost in his own mind._

_Klaus shakes his head. It hurts, irritates the steady ache that has been growing the longer he cries._

_"Dave, please, I'm not strong enough," he whispers because it's the truth, he's never been strong enough by himself. Out of everyone, he's the weak link; he's only heard it a thousand times. Can see it in how they go easy on him every time they spar—even Vanya gets more time training._

_Klaus doesn't exactly want to train, but it makes him scream regardless. He's a fucking Vietnam war vet, and he's still at the bottom of the pile._

_"You are. I know you are. I've seen you in action, sweetheart. My darling maniac." The moniker is so unexpected in this situation that Klaus finds himself laughing again. It's strangled, but it's there. Across from him, Dave's ghost smiles, fond as ever despite the blood that's dripping down his chin, smeared across his cheeks._

_Even dead, he's still beautiful, but maybe Klaus is biased._

_"S'not a good thing, Dave," he sniffs as he speaks, tries to clear his throat, it feels like an impossible task._

_"You're better than you think, sunshine."_

_"I'm a fucking wreck," Klaus rolls his eyes as he gestures to himself, hands having fallen from his ears. It's quiet now anyway with just the two of them, so what's the fucking point in trying to hide._

_"You're holding on too tight; it's tearing things apart."_

_Klaus looks down, and his hands are in Dave's clothes again, clutching tight. Beneath the bloodstains, all the threads are coming unravelled, pulling apart. Sometimes you have to unpick stitches before you can mend, sometimes you just have to start fresh with new fabric. He thinks of his mother, carefully darning socks, cutting swathes of blue to make their uniforms. Scissors are a part of every sewing kit but so is a needle, and so is thread._

_Breaking has to be followed by fixing, but Klaus has never been good at second steps. Admitting he has a problem is one thing, but there's never been a higher power to save him, girls on bikes be dammed. Around Dave's jacket, his fingers tighten. His eyes linger on the blood-stained steel of Dave's dog tags._

_"I don't know how to move on, Dave! I-I don't know how to live without you. I try. I tried. I did the fucking sober shit, clean living, ate and trained, all that bullshit but—"_

_But none of it had helped._

_"You start by letting go, sweetheart. You start by letting people in."_

_But that's the crux of the problem, isn't it? Klaus has built his walls around himself, added to them year by year. Maybe they're not expertly constructed, but he's got rings and rings of them around his soul, covering him like masks. Sometimes, he doesn't know where the walls end, and he begins._

_Dave had slipped past every one of them, found the cracks and followed the paths down to see the core of Klaus. In the end, they were kindred spirits—both of them running from something. Dave had been special._

_Klaus doesn't know how to let people in. Even Ben, who's seen him in a thousand sorry states, doesn't know every secret. Pushing people away is second nature, being part of the team was never in his stars. And Klaus hates it, but whenever he tries to reach out, he feels too small, and whenever someone reaches out too him, it's like his arms are too short. No matter what he does, he can't grasp their fingers._

_"I don't know how," he whispers. Even the shaking has died down; it's just them: Klaus, the ghost of Dave, Dave's body. Everything else is dust and smoke. He breathes in, and it still tastes like iron and sulphur, but it's a little more bearable._

_"You just need to open your eyes," Dave tells him._

_And then he's gone, and Klaus is too._

* * *

Klaus wakes up, and this time it's quiet bar the odd beeping of machines around him. The room smells sanitised: crisp, clean, surgical, but there's none of the hustle and bustle of a hospital. There's a tube down his throat—for oxygen, he assumes—and he forces himself to relax around it; after all, it's not the first time he's been intubated. Carefully he blinks, focuses on the ceiling of the infirmary. It's painfully familiar and makes his chest ache.

Outside of the room, he can hear movement, voices talking, but all of it is muffled. He wonders if Mom is around, but he doesn't try to look for her. Not yet.

His head is still spinning, too much information, too many feelings, and never enough time. Even in the quiet infirmary, the world is still sluggish, dulled down with heat that makes the world feel heavy. Klaus thinks of Dave, fingers intertwined with his own, their mouths fitted together like a puzzle finally being completed.

He thinks of Saigon and their little motel room, crowded with smoke and both of their bodies. Too many feelings and not enough time. If he focuses, he can remember how Dave's fingers had felt around his hips, the bruises that they'd left there. Dave's hands around his wrists, holding him tight.

All the promises they'd made to never let go. All the dreams they'd had of an apartment in the city and getting to explore. Klaus had vowed to get Dave in a skirt, and Dave had retaliated by telling him he'd make Klaus wear corduroy and flannel the first time they went clubbing. Both of them had broken down in fits of laughter, and Klaus had thought he'd never been so happy, not in all his shit-filled life.

Tears are leaking down his cheeks before he can stop himself. He doesn't try to breathe; the machines can do that for him. Around him, the beeping gets louder, alerting someone (everyone?) of his state, so he closes his eyes. Not yet. He can't face them yet. Just a little bit longer, that's what he needs, just a little more time.

Behind his eyes, he can see stars; he thinks of lying on the floor and drawing constellations with Dave, their hands linked together. There's motion around him now, voices and hands, someone talking in his ear.

He doesn't open his eyes. All he wants is a little more time.

Maybe then he'll be strong enough—he doubts it, but he'll try. Wrap his hands around the fragile tethers of life and try. He can do that, can't he? Klaus isn't sure. Moving forward is never as easy as stagnating. Klaus has never known what it means to be functional; every part of him has always been cracked. He thinks of glue, stitches in torn fabric. Anything can be fixed, right?

Sorry, he thinks, I'm sorry. He's not sure who he's apologising to. All his life, he's been whispering them in the dark corners of his psyche. Now every regret wants to come spilling out, but he can't talk. Never can, when it's about all the things that matter.

Klaus hitches a sob around the tube in his throat as hands smooth out his curls, small and calloused and kind. Maybe they're not Dave's hands, but they're here for him nonetheless.

In his head, he's a child again, giving himself all the hugs he craved but never got, filling the empty hole inside of him with something else instead. _I'm sorry._

In his head, he's holding hands with each of his siblings, telling them all the secrets that have built up into fortress walls, apologising for his cruelty and his fear in equal measures. He never meant to hurt them, but he'd done it anyway; it had been the easier choice at the time. _I'm sorry._

In his head, he's with Dave on that endless battlefield, foreheads pressed together, sharing final breaths. Part of him thinks he'll never escape that night, the fear and the agonising guilt. It's not his fault Dave died, he tries to tell himself, but he feels responsible nonetheless. _I'm sorry for everything I put you through._

He's trying; he really is. All he needs is a little more time. One more breath, another dive into the wide unknown. Another look at Dave's eyes, one last night with him even in the safety of his own fucked up delusional mind. _I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry,_ he chants as he lets himself free fall.

One more minute. One more hour. Just another night. He hopes they can forgive him.

(He hopes he can forgive himself.)

* * *

_"You look so perfect, honey. My lovely boy," Dave says for the third time, voice low in Klaus's ear, their bodies pressed together because there's never enough time, and they need to touch now. Make the most of the moment. It's hot, and it's sweaty because this is Saigon, and Klaus has never felt humidity like you get in Vietnam, constant steam wrapping around you like a glove._

_And, of course, this is Dave. Above him and around him. Dave, who is all-consuming in his passion and overwhelming in his love. Klaus could never have predicted this turn in his life, but he doesn't mind the path he's taken._

_After all, it brought him here. Led him to Dave. How could he ever complain about that?_

_He chokes on a sob in his throat, smooths his hands down Dave's back before he can stop himself. It's a stolen moment, one he forgives himself for thieving._

_"We have to stop," he hears himself murmur, and his voice is cracked open with grief. When he looks up, Dave's eyes are a brilliant blue despite the dim light that tinges everything grey, he thinks of heaven, and he thinks of death. Despite it all, the sight of Dave takes his breath away._

_"I know, sweetheart," Dave whispers, and when he looks down, his eyes are full of tears too, wet and glossy with fear. He's afraid. Klaus is afraid. This takes his breath away, too, makes it hitch somewhere between his mouth and nose. In his head, he images he's on his knees, grasping at salvation. This is what it means to give himself over to a higher power. This is what freedom feels like._

_It fucking hurts._

_Dave's hand cards through his hair, and they stare at each other, slow and aching because this is the last time. It has to be. Klaus leans up and slots their mouths together just so he can taste the heat of Dave's breath, cardamom and spice. They'd shared dinner in a crowded restaurant. One day he'll be hungry for pho again, be hungry for the world._

_Tears spike in the corners of his eyes. All he wants to do is sink into Dave, map every contour of his mouth. Nothing is enough; Klaus is a parched man, desperate for water and just a little more time. Every moment he tries to grasp slips through his fingertips like sand_

_"I'm sorry, kitten," Dave whispers and his voice his wet. A sob is ripped from his lips as they part, and Klaus can't stop himself now, not the tears rolling down his cheeks. Every part of him aches with emotion, and he wishes he'd stuck to feeling with his body instead of his heart._

_"You said you'd never stop," he wants to be accusing, but all he can manage is broken; the dam has cracked right down the middle. His voice is shaky, too high at all the wrong moments, and Klaus feels the opposite of confident. All at once, he's a child again, trying to pull all his pieces together. A sniff leaves him, captured by the motel room, and Dave laughs, fond and sad all at the same time. Klaus should be offended. Upset perhaps? Angry at Dave for making light of his pain. But he's not; his heart is melting again like ice cream left out too long in the sun. Klaus swallows and wishes he could hold on._

_"I know, baby. I wanted to be with you forever." Calloused fingers run their way down Klaus's cheeks again, they brush across the scruff that covers his skin. Dave always loved his beard, how Klaus refused to shave. Loved getting to pet him like a particularly needy cat—the kitten he'd always likened Klaus too. He doesn't think he'll ever be able to look at a cat again with a pang of grief, the kind that wells inside of you._

_"Dave-vuh," he whines because he's hurting, and Dave is hurting too. God, they'd had a whole life planned out together. Accepting love never came easy to Klaus; it hadn't felt natural since he'd been a child learning that care is always conditional when it comes from Reginald Hargreeves. Accepting grief is even harder, Klaus has never had to lose someone before. Not for good. Hi, ghosts, he thinks, Seance here. There's a pained expression on Dave's face, and he squeezes Klaus's cheeks together between his palms until Klaus looks like a puffer fish and then litters them with kisses._

_"I don't know any Dave-vuh's, sweetheart," he teases, and both of them laugh, sob—somewhere in between. Klaus pushes himself up, wipes his sweaty palms across the motel sheets as tears pour down his cheeks._

_"I know," Klaus whispers, "just plain old Dave."_

_God knows he's in love. Will always be in love with this man. He wants to scream at Her for taking Dave from him, but it wouldn't do any good—the little girl on a bike doesn't like him anyway. It's okay, he tells himself, because at least he had Dave for a moment. Ten glorious months._

_At least he had this. He's thankful for it that he had the chance to know every part of Dave. To let Dave know every part of him, even the ugly scarred bits that Klaus had been terrified to show. Klaus wants to scream at God, but he'll thank Her too. No higher power can ever take this away from him; he'll always have the memories._

_"Plain old Dave," Dave murmurs back. Klaus wishes they had more time to slow down, enjoy all the little moments before they even work their way into the big picture, but time is the one thing they don't have. Klaus dived into the vast ocean that people call love, and now he's got to come up for air, pressure sickness be damned._

_He reaches up and runs his hands through Dave's curls, tight and bouncy with the humidity. Wraps them around his fingers around each individual lock. Presses Hello to one side of Dave's head and Goodbye to the other. Fuck, it hurts. Why does it have to hurt so much?_

_"I don't know how to live without you, Dave," he breathes out, wanting nothing more than the chance to pull Dave closer. In the grey light, they share another kiss, and neither of them mentions that it's not spit making things wet. Klaus can taste salt on his lips, his eyes prickling and hot._

_"You live the way you deserve to, honey. You live life to the fullest." Fingers trail down his neck as Dave speaks, achingly familiar. Klaus squeezes his eyes shut because the thought of that hurts like shrapnel, a bullet between his ribs. For a moment, his heart jumps out of sync because Dave never understood what Klaus deserved. He didn't deserve Dave, their stolen kisses and the time they made between the battles. Not the love that Dave bathed him in every minute that he had the chance. Klaus has only ever been worthy of back alleys and club bathrooms, hands around his throat to remind him that his life never mattered—not in the grand scheme of things._

_"Dave, I'm not good enough. I can't… How?" He knows he's making Dave sad, his own voice is scratchy, tight around the lump of his heart. Above him, Dave shifts and wraps his arms around Klaus. His weight is heavy and solid, grip perfectly tight. He doesn't smother or try to choke Klaus out, but it knocks the breath from Klaus's lungs regardless. Behind his watery eyes, the whole world spins._

_"You're worthy of this, Klaus. You deserve this. Life is right outside your window, waiting for you to grab on. You're strong enough to take it." Hands cup his face again, thumbs brushing over the sharp angle of Klaus's cheekbones. When he inhales, it's with an awful, watery gasp and Klaus trembles like a lead about to be blown off a tree._

_"Dave. I miss you so—so much," his voice cracks in the middle of his sentence and the tissue paper membrane of his pride breaks, tearing under the enormity of the realisation. Dave looks at him, holds him like he's fragile._

_He's right too. Klaus has never felt as weak as this._

_"I know, kitten. I know," he whispers, sounding as wrecked as Klaus feels. Every inch of Klaus's body shakes now, shoulders rocking as he tries to hold back the sobs the wrack his body. Each one is raw, animalistic. It's not fair, he thinks, how he has to move on without Dave. Not fair, how his own body betrays him with its responses._

_"I don't want to be alone," he gasps, drops his head back as he tries to draw in great heaving breaths. Sweat drips down his neck, finds its way across his forehead and temples to mingle with his tears. Nothing is enough to soothe this pain; everything is too much to bear. Klaus frees Dave from his grip, and it feels like letting go of smoke._

_"You won't be alone, sweetheart." There's that fond smile on Dave's face, the type he gets when he watches Klaus cheat at poker or when he opens up about his family. The one that hurts to see because it reveals too many of Dave's emotions, and it's more than Klaus can bare. Blue eyes shine with unshed tears, and Klaus is reminded, all at once, of why he loves Dave._

_Because Dave has never once thought less of him. Because Dave has always tried to give him what he thinks Klaus deserves._

_"They're all assholes," Klaus says, laughing again to try and stop his crying. A hand—his own hand, Hello—comes to rest on his chest as he thinks of his siblings. His goddamn shitty family. "Maybe I'll just strike it out alone. I've done it before."_

_Dave raises a brow as if he knows it's an idle threat—one Klaus won't go through it. The smile on his face doesn't falter for a second, and Klaus takes a moment to just stare, take in Dave's features through the haze of the room._

_Eventually, Dave smiles, "They love you. You love them."_

_"I do," Klaus sniffs, "I really fucking do."_

_He feels childish, like a spring wound too tight, all his emotions threatening to spill over at any moment. Dave leans in, brushes their lips together again; Klaus can taste the sea on his mouth._

_"Dave, I'm fucking terrified," he admits, reaching out to drag his hands over Dave's chest, Goodbye resting over his heart._

_"I know, sunshine. I know," Dave whispers into his ear, wrapping them together so he can squeeze Klaus tight. A wail, desperate and adrift, rips out of him. Klaus knows he's being torn in two. Knows he can't stay here and can't come back._

_"I just don't want to lose you," he croaks out, and Dave nuzzles into his hair, makes him shudder on a sob. His fingertips curl where they're pressed against Dave's skin, memorising all his angles, how they're covered in a soft layer of fat. Comforting like a teddy bear and perfect for cuddling. Memories bubble up unbidden of every time they'd curled together, and Dave's arms curl tighter around him._

_"Sweetheart, I'll still be with you. No matter how tough it gets, I'll be in your heart, but you have to let this go," Klaus knows this is ruining him, trying to cling on to Dave. In the dull lamplight, he can remember every fucking choice he'd made, every moment he'd dragged himself down._

_It had started with the heatwave that spread across the city like fog and ended with pills and the grey glint of a knife. He thinks of his siblings, all of them crowding around him with fear. He thinks of Ben, the way their family had fallen apart._

_Klaus doesn't want to make them lose another sibling._

_"It just hurts so fucking much," he's choking again, on spit and snot and tears. Totally unattractive, he thinks, but there's no-one here, but Dave and Dave has never been phased by Klaus breaking down before. Lips brush against the pulse point of his neck, and Klaus's heart stutters, a moth going into a flame._

_"It'll get better with time. You're strong Klaus, you'll find your way," Dave's words are muffled into his skin. Klaus tangles fingers into his curls again, those soft proto-ringlets, and he weeps for the Dave who never got to grow them out, never got to grow old with him. The Dave that never escaped Vietnam._

_"I'm so fucking stupid. For all of this. For everything I've done," he whispers, his own thoughts circling around and around in his head._

_"You've never been stupid, Klaus," Dave tells him, slowly picking apart every straw that had broken his back. Klaus snorts, thick and wet, runs his Goodbye down Dave's chest while he still has the chance._

_"Davey-baby, that's blatantly untrue," he whispers and then laughs, the tinny sound filling the room._

_"No sunshine, it's not," Dave doesn't bring up all of Klaus's impulsive decisions, all the poor choices he's made and for that, Klaus thanks him and hates him equally. He pokes his fingers into Dave's stomach to make him huff, and it works. Tension builds and melts away over and over again. Klaus breathes in through his nose to stop himself from choking._

_"You have too much faith in me." Now he knows he's trying to deflect, is grasping tight at every second that goes by, trying to drag them out into minutes. It doesn't work (never has worked with Dave), a finger tilts his chin up, and he looks into Dave's eyes._

_"I have exactly the right amount of faith," Dave says, slow and serious, with no trace of a lie in his voice. Another wall cracks, another mask falls._

_"You'll wait for me?" He asks, thinking of God, of barbershops and his father's razor blades. One day he'll end up there again, he thinks; one day, he'll be let in for sure._

_"You gonna live your life first?" Dave counters, quick as a bullet—he always was too smart to end up with Klaus, Klaus thinks, but he wouldn't trade a fucking second._

_"Fine. Fine, you asshole. I'll try." With that, the whole fucking fortress that has been Klaus Hargreeves comes tumbling down, and in the mess of the rubble, all that's left is him. Broken, terrified, alone._

_But willing to try._

_"You know I'll wait forever for you, Klaus," Dave whispers, a smile spreading across his face. That look, the one Klaus wants to kiss as if he might be able to absorb it into himself—all that love, all that affection—is all he needs. Klaus stares leans forwards, and kisses him again. Swallows every ounce of care that Dave ever had for him; he'll use it to patch himself up when things get hard. Have it in his heart for the rest of his life._

_"I love you, Dave Katz," he whispers with all the sincerity he can muster, pours every drop of it into his words._

_"I love you, Klaus Hargreeves. I will always love you," Dave's voice is just as soft, his eyes as wet as Klaus's own._

_"I just have to open my eyes, right?" He asks, dragging Goodbye across Dave's chest, the open wound of his heart. It's bleeding now, dripping sticky blood over his fingers. Klaus will feel it forever, in the corners of his nails, the grooves of his knuckles, but that's okay._

_He can handle it. He can live with it. Not all things that are sticky are bad, after all._

_"That's it. All you have to do is open your eyes," Dave tells him, voice fading now, wavering like light as the sun goes down._

_"They're waiting for me, right?" He closes his eyes because he doesn't want to see Dave go, be left in this empty room with nothing but his own fucking memories. It's the last gift he'll give himself._

_"You know they are," Dave is far away, muffled by the rush of blood in Klaus's ears. Klaus hopes he rests easy, this Dave in his mind and the one in the light too._

_"Okay. I can do this," he whispers the promise to himself, drags up the final dredges of his courage and his strength._

_And he opens his eyes._

* * *

Klaus wakes up, and it's morning, and the world is awash with sunlight. Gold bathes the room, turns the dull wood of the infirmary rosy, the beams glinting off Diego's hair. All of them are asleep now, perched in various places around the room. Vanya leaning against Luther on the tiny waiting room chairs, Diego and Allison both slumped across another bed. Five is closest, chair pulled up close to Klaus's bed, face screwed up tight, his eyebrows furrowed.

And then there's Ben, leaning against the door, arms crossed over his chest. He's as put together as ever—thanks ghost powers—but Klaus can see the worry in the curl of his mouth, the way his jaw is clenched.

Slowly, so he doesn't wake Five, Klaus raises a hand. Hello.

"You're a fucking," Ben starts, stops, swallows, "I thought we were gonna lose you," he finishes, and he sounds heartbreakingly sad. Klaus tries to mouth something, but there's still a tube in his throat, getting kind of uncomfortable, so all he can do is make sad eyes at Ben, try to apologise without words.

If Ben is in such a state, it must have been bad because Ben has seen Klaus in more ambulances than he can count on his fingers and his toes. He shifts and tries to shrug.

This wakes up Five because Five is a little maniac assassin who sleeps about as lightly as Klaus himself.

"Shit, you're awake," is the first thing he says. Klaus rolls his eyes and waves Hello at him too. "You with us?" Comes next, so Klaus nods, gestures to the tube in his throat and mimes pulling it out.

"Don't you dare," Ben and Five say in unison. Klaus sticks his middle finger up at them both and huffs as best he can, reaches out to prod Five hard in the shoulder. He gestures to the tube again and makes a pleading face. Now, in the morning light, he can see the bandages wrapped tight around his wrists. A flash of memory comes to him, the memory of a knife against his skin.

A shudder goes through him, and he pokes insistently at Five again. If Five doesn't remove the damn tube, he'll do it himself—he has things to say after all.

"Fine," Five huffs like an old man (he is an old man, Klaus reminds himself) and leans over, "cough now," he instructs, and so Klaus does. The tube comes out, and he wheezes, wipes spit away from his mouth. Above them, both the air conditioning rattles, blasts a cool breeze across their skin.

"Fuck are you doing, Five," Diego mutters, sitting up. Allison slips, tumbles and almost rolls off the bed. When she gets her bearings, she groans and smacks Diego across the arm; it's such a familiar movement that Klaus can't help but laugh, a hoarse, raspy sound that makes his throat ache.

"Removing the intubation before he does it himself," Five rolls his eyes, sits back slowly. He watches Klaus like one watches a rabid dog, as if waiting for it to bite, so Klaus sticks his tongue out and then coughs again.

"Th'nks, lil' bro," Klaus mutters to be an asshole, his voice dry and scratchy, "water would be nice."

"Don't call me that," Five hisses and blinks across the room, within a moment, there's a glass of water in Klaus's hands, and it's deliciously cold, almost icy to the touch. Once again, Five stares at him. "Sip that. Don't drink it all at once."

As if Klaus hasn't been in enough hospitals to know that.

"Yes, Mom," he mutters, but he does as told. It's like ambrosia going down, soothing the sharp sparking pain in his throat. In Five's forehead, Klaus can see a frustrated vein pulsing, but his brother's hands are also shaking, and he lets the bitching slide. Guilt spikes in his chest, and Klaus sips at his drink again. He's not ignoring the feeling, he tells himself; he just needs to wait for them to all to wake up.

"Are you sure that's safe? Mom said he needed oxygen," Diego stands and makes as if to hover over Klaus, the way he did for overdoses one through six. After that, he stopped coming to the hospital, and Klaus had missed him like a limb, taken copious amounts of painkillers to dull the hurt.

He waves Hello at Diego too.

"Yeah, well, it's better than letting him rip it out himself."

"Five's probably right," Allison chimes in, sitting cross-legged on the bed, and Klaus tries to smile at her, but she doesn't look very happy. Make-up is smudged around her eyes, and there are tear tracks along her cheeks. Tears that Klaus had put there. Another pang of guilt.

All the noise wakes Vanya and Luther; one comes to his bedside and the other to the door.

"I'm not going anywhere, Luther." Klaus gestures at himself, the infirmary bed, the various wires and lines hooked up to him.

"You ran last time,"

"Well, I'm not off my head on uppers now," he says, voice low with frustration, and Vanya winces by his side. Wrong thing to say; he's being an idiot as usual. Why anyone sticks around him, Klaus doesn't know, but they're all here now. All his asshole family.

"Don't be a dick, Klaus," Ben says to him and him alone. Klaus mouths sorry at him and looks back down at his water. It's crystal clear, and condensation drips over the tips of his fingers.

"How do you feel?" Vanya asks, and she sounds small again, like she's back on her meds. Klaus thinks, his arms hurt, his head hurts, his whole fucking body feels like he was hit by a truck. It's shit. He feels like he's died and come back to life more than once—which is possibly true, and Klaus tries not to think about the swathes of grey he'd seen. This, he decides, is not the right thing to say. Not right now, when everything is fragile.

"Better," he swallows halfway through the words and looks up. Dave's words echo in his head, they love you. They love me. Klaus is tired of hurting people, however indirectly.

"What the fuck—" Diego starts to say, but Klaus can feel tears pricking the corners of his eyes again, all hot and hard to ignore. He waves Goodbye in Diego's direction and takes in a rattling gasp for air.

"Oxygen," Five says, but Klaus puts his middle finger up at him.

"Fuck, no. Just give me a second."

"Klaus, you need to rest." As always, Allison tries to take charge, but Klaus waves Goodbye at her too. He just needs a second to catch his thoughts before they escape again.

"Rest-schmest. No. Fuck. I'm fucking this up," he's kicking at rubble, trying to find a path out. There's always something littering the way, but it's easier now. He breathes in again, deep as he can, "I'm sorry. Fuck, I'm so fucking sorry."

Apologies have never come easily in this family, but Klaus needs them to know.

"You don't have to be sorry for a breakdown," Vanya says softly. Klaus shakes his head at her and sighs, brings his hands up to brush his hair from his face.

"Not for that. Well, kinda for that but not just that. I mean, I wasn't, uh, all there, but I still didn't mean to, you know, freak everyone the fuck out. I mean," his throat hurts, he sips more water as if it might help, "I'm sorry I didn't reach out. Ever really. I mean, I was a mess, I've always been a mess, but we were supposed to be doing this whole family thing and like supporting each other and shit, and I didn't—I went off alone."

For a long moment, there's silence, Klaus doesn't look at anyone. He can't, it hurts too much, he doesn't want to see their disappointment.

"You're an unbelievable idiot, Four," Five's words should hurt, but they're choked up, coming out tiny and far too young. Klaus turns to look at him, and there's tears beading at the corners of Five's eyes, his lips pulled back in a snarl, "and if you ever fucking do that again, I'll kill you myself, but you don't have to apologise. What the fuck is wrong with you? What the fuck is wrong with all of us?" He says and slumps back in his chair. A finger is waved threateningly in his direction.

Klaus bites the corner of his mouth, "uh, sorry?"

"Stop fucking apologising," Five snaps, and he holds his hands up in surrender.

"You know I would like an apology; you nearly broke my shin. How the fuck, Klaus, that's like the strongest bone you can't be telling me you have that much strength in your scrawny ass?"

"Shut up, Diego," Allison elbows him in the ribs, and a groan leaves him, high and wheezy. It reminds Klaus of a deflated balloon.

"You probably deserved that," Klaus croaks out and tries to plaster his familiar shit-eating grin on his face, but it doesn't work when he's halfway to full-on sobbing.

"Deserved it?!" Diego's incredulous yell is muffled out by Luther almost punching out the door—and right through Ben's head too. His ghostly brother sighs and wanders over to another corner of the room. Klaus gives him a wide-eyed grimace before turning back to Luther.

The big lug is—crying?

Allison throws her hands up with a shout. "Luther, the door!"

"Klaus," Luther ignores her in favour of a pained sound, "you are an idiot."

"Why do people keep saying that?" He yells and then regrets it instantly when pain ping-pongs through his body and leaves him groaning.

"Case in point," Diego says before squawking as Allison kicks him in the shin—serves him right.

"Because you're acting like one," Five says, petulant as a real teenager.

"I'm trying to apologise."

"Klaus," Vanya murmurs, hand coming to rest on his arm, just above the bandages, "you don't have anything to say sorry for. We've all been shit to each other—"

"But if you do that again, I will end you,"

"Five!" Allison sounds at the end of her rope, and Klaus looks to Ben helplessly. _Help_ , he mouths. Ben just shrugs.

"You got yourself into this," he says after a moment, a hand resting on his hip. Klaus can't quite place the look on his face, all scrunched up and eyebrows furrowed.

"Bitch." He mutters in Ben's direction.

Luther frowns. "What?"

"Nothing!" Klaus coughs and then spills water over his lap that soaks the blanket through. "Fuck! Now I look like I've wet myself. "

"Is this really the time?"

"It wasn't on purpose! "

"All of you shut up! "Allison throws her hands up again and then coughs herself, and Klaus is reminded of the wound on her throat, the one still barely healed.

"Sorry, Ally," he murmurs.

"Klaus, I'm going to tell you one time, you don't need to apologise for having a breakdown. Now, if you're apologising for stealing my eyeliner again, I'll accept." She smiles at the end of her sentence, and Klaus lets out a choked sound. A snort or a sob—it's hard to tell.

"It wasn't exactly a breakdown."

"Then what, wh-what the fuck was it?" Diego interjects, hands twitching the way he gets when he's angry or nervous or really feeling any emotion at all. The way that says he wants a knife. Klaus backpedals as quick as he can.

"Well, it was a breakdown, kinda, and like… the heatwave. It reminded me of, you know—" he makes a vague gesture with his hands. Across from him, Five's eyes narrow, gaze sharp, and Klaus won't mention to anyone, but still a little a watery. This whole emotional honesty business is exhausting.

"What?" Diego is still watching him, rocking on his heels. Klaus breaks with a sob.

"Vietnam! It reminded me of, of the fucking summer in Vietnam," he slumps back into the bed and covers his face again to hide how the tears are making trenches in his cheeks again.

"Oh," Vanya whispers.

"PTSD," Luther says at the same time, and Klaus peeks at him from between his fingers; everyone is shooting him an incredulous look. "What? I read."

The thing is, Klaus thinks, he's not wrong. More than once, he'd seen people with the shakes in Vietnam. Men older than him, men younger than him, all of them traumatised by the ongoing, endless suffering. PTSD is the obvious and correct conclusion for the day and age they're all in.

Only it wasn't a new development for Klaus. He thinks of his father and the mausoleum, all the things he'd only ever told to Dave—secrets he'd kept from even Ben.

Slowly, he takes in another breath. "I want to talk," he says, voice carefully measured to hide how it's trembling.

And so they do. Halting, stilted conversation but one way or another, it all comes out—word after awful word. From Klaus first, but then Diego, Vanya, Allison, Five, Ben (through Klaus, of course) and eventually even Luther. It's not everything at once. They stop, eat food, rest together with their hands intertwined whenever they get the chance.

Slowly, the heatwave ends, no matter how it tries to drag its heels. And when it does, Klaus sits in his bedroom, holds Dave's dog tags and thinks it doesn't hurt quite as much as it did before.

* * *

In the time that comes, After, Klaus has good days and bad days. Days where he wakes up and gets out of bed, makes—or at least eats—breakfast, teaches Five how to fly a kite and tries his best to keep plants alive with Luther. Days where he moans about celebrity culture over dairy-free yoghurt with Allison and listens to Vanya play, where Diego goes running with him in the mornings, and he manages to play patty-cake with Ben.

Those are the good days.

Then there are the bad days where the pain is like a monster sitting on his chest. When the siren-song of drugs feels impossible to ignore, and all Klaus wants to do is close his eyes and retreat into himself, find the dying place and rest there forever. On those days, he finds his siblings. Slumps against them while he knits until his hands shake too much, talks about whatever gossip Vanya heard at the orchestra, eats whatever food he can stomach.

Slowly, they come together as a family, the way they always should have.

A month later, he wears a short-sleeve shirt again, finds it easier to throw himself in the deep end. People give him looks when he goes grocery shopping with Diego, but he cocks a hip at them, lets the acid green skirt do all the talking. And if anyone tries to say something, Diego just has to glare at them.

Which is nice despite the fact that Klaus can absolutely take care of himself. It's nice to have the reminder that Diego cares.

At six months, he gets a job.

Ben worries about the 'establishment' and calls it shady, but the thrift shop is just where Klaus fits in, full of odds and ends that he can take his time cataloguing. He likes talking with his customers, soon learns to pick out the regulars and manages to form friends with a few of them. Annie, with her bangles that go up to her elbows, Leo, who tells him about hallucinations and how he's never felt entirely real. Even Jen, with her flask, always tucked under her leather jacket and smile that speaks just a little too close to home.

They're not his family, but he comes to love them nonetheless.

The other great thing about the thrift shop is that donated items are often old and more than once come with a ghost attached. These are not the ghouls of his childhood, ripped apart criminals or the dead who have been locked away so long they've already lost their humanity. Most of them are grandmas and grandpas, who never got the chance to say goodbye. He learns more about his powers and more about himself through them—how to knit a scarf, Esther's prize goulash recipe. Things that people never got to say.

It's hard sometimes. He misses Dave like a hole in his heart, but he learns how to cook, how to sew. How to break things apart in order to put them back together. Piece by piece, he patchworks himself together, figures out what he can salvage and what needs to be replaced. In the mansion, he changes rooms, turns the whole attic into his den, and it's big enough for the whole family to pile into.

Their birthday comes and goes. Klaus is the second oldest now, and he lords it over all his siblings bar Five—who looks infinitely less threatening in a party hat. At eleven months, he manages to make Ben whole (or as whole as a ghost can get) for a full day. There are a lot of tears and a lot more hugs. When everyone else has passed out, Ben wraps an arm around Klaus's shoulder, and they sit together to watch the stars.

"I'm proud of you," Ben tells him. It means more than Ben knows; Klaus just doesn't have the words to tell him.

At a year, they all go to Washington as a family trip. Klaus sits for an hour or so at the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial and wonders if Dave's body ever made it home. His siblings sit by him, talking, laughing, at least one of them in contact with him at all times. They love him, and he loves them.

He stares at the memorial for a while and then looks at the sky. It's bright, cloudless blue.

"I love you, Dave Katz," he tells it, and it doesn't hurt quite as much as he thought it would.

**Author's Note:**

> The longest oneshot I've ever written, this was meant to stay beneath 10k words and became an almost 30k behemoth of feelings that i just couldn't stop writing until it was done. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!
> 
> Please comment and Kudos if you liked it! You can follow me on [@forestdivinity](https://forestdivinity.tumblr.com/) for more content!
> 
> Special thanks to [Elliot's House discord](https://discord.gg/dGg2Tb) for all your support!


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